On the High Seas
by JMK758
Summary: The Agents take a round trip Cruise from Los Angeles to Puerto Vallarta in hopes of a week of rest and recreation. After all, what could possibly go wrong on the Love Boat? Generally updated in 2016 with improvements.
1. Failure

For my 35th Full Length NCIS Mystery, the Fifth Mystery of my Fourth Season and my 90th FanFiction posting, I have to do something unique. My first official Crossover ('Judgment on Risa', NCIS + ST:TNG = SCIS) was so much fun to write that I had to do another. I think you'll be surprised by a lot of things that happen here.  
Playing with time as I did with 'Judgment on Risa' and again offering neither justification nor explanation, I've jumped the Love Boat's 'Pacific Princess' and its crew up to the present while making a few alterations such as smart phones and plasma screens. I also re-present Merrill Stubing's 19 year old daughter Vicki, who can now see his still balding pate from slightly above.  
Recognizing that few know both shows, I spend a few paragraphs introducing each character from each series before we get into the action. I trust this is a seamless operation.  
As usual I make no money on this - _aaarrggh_! - nor am I trying to take any characters. NCIS is owned by Belisarius Productions and the Love Boat is owned by Aaron Spelling Productions. I own all Original Characters. This story, due to blood, frank language and sexual references, is rated T or NC-is 17.  
So settle down; the NCIS Agents are on vacation and they invite you to join them

On the High Seas  
by JMK758  
Chapter One  
Failure

The windows that look north from the third floor Operations Division into the Capital Mall, the Washington Monument usually prominent, are dark and rain battered, much too dark for this Thursday morning. The storm has raged since yesterday and shows every sign of remaining stalled here through tomorrow while it continues to scoop up and dump the Atlantic Ocean upon the city.

Tony DiNozzo tosses his short umbrella into his garbage can lest it soak his cubicle and peels off his raincoat, the material making a loud sucking sound as it releases his body. "If this keeps up I'm going back to the Seahawk where I can dry off." He hadn't enjoyed his months as a Special Agent Afloat but what's the point of being a landlubber if you have to spend two days wet?

The driving rain had begun yesterday afternoon, the last day of their Investigation into the Jimmy Sullivan case, then actually being an advantage in his defeat and capture, but it's time for all bad things to come to a sopping end.

x

"Hey, McMonsoon, your wife has pull with the Big Man. Think she can talk Him into turning off the waterworks?"

"Forget it, Tony. She was talking this morning about God's gift of rain for the flowers that've been thirsty for three whole weeks."

Now wet and frustrated, he sits down and hopes the building's AC will suck some of the moisture out of his shoes. "Thirsty. The rose bush outside my building asked me to call for a Coast Guard rescue." He looks across the bullpen to their 'till now silent partner.

"Do not look to me, Tony," she challenges. "Do you happen to know the annual rainfall figures for Israel?"

"I think we broke that record. I'm booking my next vacation in your home town." The chime of the elevator's bell pulls his attention down the corridor. "Well, well, well, and my day was going so well, too. What are you two doing here?"

Jimmy Palmer wears an ankle long London Fog raincoat, Michelle a significantly smaller yellow slicker and matching hat. It at least has one good point, Tony thinks; being as short as a miniskirt, it displays her bare legs to their full advantage. She runs her hands quickly over the vinyl material, casting away droplets as they step into the bullpen.

"Darned if we know," Jimmy says. "We swore on Tuesday we wouldn't set foot in this building again until our vacation was over, but Cynthia Sumner summoned us in and here we are."

Michelle gives another brush to her yellow slicker. "Didn't even manage two whole days." They'd had a picnic with the McGees scheduled for Friday the 27th and weren't due to return to work until Monday the 30th. "She said the Director wanted to see us at 0700."

Tony glares at Michelle as the castoff sprinkles hit the open folders on his desk. "You're late," he says, shoving droplets from the papers.

"Two minutes," she retorts, raising her hands to brush off more rain.

"Do it and die, Naamah."

x

Jimmy is about to challenge the threat but the name shorts his outrage. "Naamah?"

"Noah's wife." He looks about at the four faces - Gibbs, who knows everything, doesn't count. "Noah's Ark?" Still not much. "Hey, I read."

"I am actually impressed," Ziva says.

"The Bible doesn't give her name," Tim says. In the past year he's come to know those 66 books intimately, as among other things Siobhan - 'Shav' to no one but himself - uses him as her sounding board for her weekly Bible Study classes. He hasn't attended one session, yet he stands in the top percentile for the Course.

"No," Ziva agrees, "but Jewish tradition does hold the names of the women aboard the Ark."

x

"You guys getting ready for your big move back?" Tim asks, mostly to preempt any further conflict. The Cleaners have reportedly removed all traces of blood and worse from their bedroom last evening and the couple will be able to move back into their restored apartment today. He's certain they're looking forward to leaving the Kenilworth Safe Apartment behind.

"Can't wait," Michelle declares, turns to Gibbs. "Thank you."

"I didn't do anything. Thank the Crime Scene Cleaners." It's not the company Mikel Mawher had run and they'd done an excellent job removing the dried blood and decaying detritus of Alan Stephens from the bedroom.

He'd inspected the bedroom this morning, in a most demanding mood and declared the work excellent. If he'd been able to find a spot of blood on ceiling, light blue walls or white shag carpet, he wouldn't sign off on the payment. In fact, the whole wall to wall carpet was better than it had been the other day.

"We will," Jimmy says. "I'd been so scared we'd have to move." It's a fate he's truly happy to dodge.

"Don't get your hope too high, darling," she warns. "I agreed this time, but one more incident and we're out of there."

x

But a repeat of that spectacular incident, a burglar breaking in and exploding, is unlikely even in NCIS and none of this answers Tony's question. "Why does the Director want to see you? You've been playing hooky for two plus weeks, so it can't be anything you've done."

"I want to see _all_ of you," Jennifer Shepherd's voice descends from high above. The agents look up to the fourth floor platform outside MTAC. She holds a small stack of black file folders and her mood is even blacker. "All six of you. Up here. Right now."

The Agents and Examiner search one another's eyes for some clue for the grim summons, but no one has an answer. Ascending the stairs, each has the impression that they're being summoned to the Principal's office, or in the case of the older Gibbs, the woodshed.

No one expects this will end as well.

xx

"Sit down," Shepherd commands from the top of the ramp as the agents file past her, more surprised to find Abby in the well, pacing in a paroxysm of anxiety. Gibbs has paused to be last.

"Jenn?" he asks very quietly when the others are out of range.

She grips the folders more tightly and her voice drops to a furious whisper. "Sit. _Down_."

She glares at the group as the active duty agents take the front row, the Palmers behind them with Abby and the couple probably thinks she doesn't notice they're holding hands below the level of the seats. Shepherd descends the ramp to stand before the apprehensive men and women.

"I have here," she holds up the seven black folders, "the results of the Annual Psychological Evaluations you each took last month." She accurately reads their expressions. "Normally we _would_ discuss them privately but this time there's little point. I'll make this short and not at all sweet." She shoves the folders down to her side. "You all _failed_!"

x

DiNozzo is the first to recover his voice and he expresses his protest with an astonished grin. "There must be some mistake."

"Well, Agent DiNozzo, I don't know exactly how you did it but your failure was among the more spectacular."

His calculated smile dies and he decides he knows better than to try to resurrect it.

"Director," Tim tries, "are you sure you–"

"Agent McGee, you suffered a psychotic break where you believed yourself to be a fictional character from one of your books, in the course of which you attempted to murder Agent DiNozzo not one time, but _twice_. Immediately thereafter you were captured and tortured near to the point of death."

"But Tim–" Ziva tries to protest.

"Agent David, since your last evaluation you were captured by a woman with a girdle of explosives strapped to her, who blew herself up in front of your desk. The Doctors are still not satisfied you've recovered from that–"

"I ha–"

"and neither am I." Ziva is silenced but she's not the last.

"Director, I swear to you–"

"Abby, you take Goth affection to the point of sleeping in a coffin while wearing a funeral shroud, and when you were hunted by Mikel Mawher that second time you suffered a near nervous breakdown and I'm still amazed you came out of that situation even reasonably whole, considering what you had to do. You are so physically and psychologically addicted to caffeine I fear the results of your withdrawal and you maintain a work schedule that is considered unhealthy at the very best.

x

All the agents look to their boss, the ultimate fixer.

"Don't even think of it. Think Mexico. And don't get me _started_ on Agent and Doctor Palmer."

Jimmy looks as though he wants to protest but Michelle grips his hand tighter.

"So then what's next?" Gibbs asks for his team, hoping he can find something that he can salvage for them if not for himself.

"NCIS Regulations are very clear on my next duty. I'm to collect your shields, IDs and weapons and have Security escort each you off the Yard. You'll be notified by Registered Mail about the dates of your next Evaluations."

She watches that fate play across their faces. Suspension, likely without pay, until they can satisfy the Shrinks of their stability to come back and do their jobs. It's possible that not all of them will _be_ back.

x

"Fortunately, there's an alternative. I've called in a favor from an old friend, Captain Merrill Stubing, without telling him why I cashed in my Marker. He's the Captain of a Cruise Ship operating out of the Port of Los Angeles, the Pacific Princess. I've booked each of you on a week long vacation.

"You leave _this afternoon_ at sixteen hundredfor Los Angeles, lay over at the airport hotel, board the ship tomorrow morning; it sails at 0800 so set your alarms. Hopefully, immediately after a week at sea with nothing more stressful than dancing and dining, you'll be ready to retake - and _pass_ \- your Evaluations."

She focuses her glare on Gibbs. "That means you won't have time to stop off at the OSP or anywhere else. You'll bring no Case Files, nothing at all of NCIS, but since you're not officially Suspended - yet - you can retain your IDs and weapons, provided you behave yourselves. Cynthia has placed the Ticket vouchers, hotel reservations and itineraries on each of your desks. Those of you who want to make particular arrangements may do so by calling the Cruise Line."

Her glare turns general. "And don't think of saying 'we've had vacations'. Gibbs, your last 'vacation' was when you retired to Mexico and we all know what's happened since. Abby, your going to New Orleans wasn't a vacation when you spent most of it trying to keep your friend from committing suicide. Palmers, think of this as a second Honeymoon and time to work out your Issues before you two set the record for the shortest marriage in Headquarters history."

"Thank you so much," Michelle says with no love.

"I call things as they are. There's no reason to sugar coat anything. And Agents McGee and DiNozzo... good luck."

"Thank you," Tim says in the same tone as his partner. She knows his wife holds two jobs and doesn't have a whole lot of leeway in how she does them.

"It's obvious you planned this thoroughly," Tony says, his mind on how to put together a paired trip with barely eight hours before wheels up.

"Being confident you'd wrap up that case once you identified Sullivan - even when all of you are stressed out you're the best I've got - I started setting it up. The minute you were done with Sullivan yesterday, you were done."

x

"But–" Abby can't stop thinking about the number of cases that could come up in the coming week.

"Ruby Rae is already driving in. You can greet her on your way _out_. You can cover all she needs to know but then you get home and pack."

"I remember my last 'night off'," she grouches, seeing by the women's faces that both Jennifer and Michelle remember that Pre-Grand Opening Night at the 'House on Haunted Hill'. "We had to break cover to solve a murder."

"I guarantee that you will not be investigating a murder aboard the Pacific Princess. Dismissed." Nobody moves, probably too stunned by vacations they'll never get out of. "Anyone still here in thirty seconds time has chosen the Suspension."

xxx

Called by the overhead speaker to the Third Floor Nurse's Station, Jeanne picks up the phone. "Doctor Benoit."

"Doctor," an extremely familiar voice says in even more familiar seductive tones, "I'm having this horrible pain in, you know, that noisy thing in your chest?"

"Heart?"

"That's it, heart."

But there's a peculiar reverberation to his voice and she even hears the heavy rain smacking the large window to her left in virtual stereo. She looks in that direction, locates him by said window. He's wearing a damp blue windbreaker but his short umbrella is building a puddle at his feet. "Are you sure it's not an empty feeling in your scrotum?"

His eyebrows try to hide under his hairline as he puts the cell phone away and emerges from the cul-de-sac. "Ouch, baby. Major ouch."

"I thought you might have emptied it over the past three days."

"If I did, I won't have to look too far for a refill prompt."

She pulls him away and down the corridor lest their conversation become grist for the rumor mill. "Not that I'm not happy to see you, but why am I seeing you."

"I need a medical opinion."

"You're a sex obsessed Satyr with delusions of grandeur and no impulse control."

"I'd like a second opinion."

"You won't once you hear it."

"I'm serious."

x

She halts, pulls him around and stares up into his eyes. "You're serious."

"I just said that."

"What's wrong, honey?" These aren't the days when she thought he was a Professor of Film Studies. Ever since their break-up and reunion, when he says his life is dangerous she knows he means it.

He reaches into his windbreaker, removes an envelope and hands it to her. "Director Shepherd thinks I need a therapeutic cruise." She pulls out the paper, reads the voucher.

"She's right, though I'd've recommended the Psych Ward instead.

" _I_ think I need to bring my Doctor with me."

She examines the voucher more carefully. The plane reservation is for 4:00 pm, a five hour cross country flight landing at 6:00 California time, then a layover at the airport hotel before ship-boarding by 8:00 in the morning. " _Tonight_?"

"Is that going to be a big problem?"

She considers for a moment. "I think you're suffering a major break from reality. Your condition will require constant monitoring to be sure you don't become a danger to yourself."

"Will you be able to get the time?"

"I have some coming," she pushes the vouchers back into the envelope, "but to get it _today_ is going to take a Song and Dance worthy of Busby Berkeley."

xxx

Reverend Siobhan McGee, Curate of Saint Mary the Virgin Church, looks up from a Diocesan Appeal letter from the Episcopal Relief and Development Foundation when she hears soft raps at the open office door and Father Donaldson, seated at his desk at the left wall, doesn't acknowledge the visitor.

" _Timmy._ " He's dry, no raincoat so maybe the downpour has become scattered as per the NWS forecast for the mid-morning, torrential but spread apart, but his grim expression brings its own storm clouds. It obliterates her joy at this surprise visit and she feels hands wrench her heart. "You're going away."

"Yes. No. Yes." He looks to the priest at his right. "Sorry to interrupt, Father."

x

"No problem." Donaldson knows his partner's husband is occasionally called away, often without notice, often with a belated call from Norfolk base prior to a flight to Afghanistan or Syria or Iran or some such place asking her not to worry. He'd often doubted the point of saying it, since it only makes her worry even more intensely as she locks her attention upon every word ZNN brings from whatever part of the world the man has been thrust into. On this occasion there seems to be time and he'll hardly begrudge the man a few (last?) minutes with his wife.

"Timmy, what's _wrong_?"

Donaldson has very rarely heard Siobhan sound so frightened, but any time he's heard anything even approach that tone it in some way involves this man and his job.

"Errr, uh." The man doesn't seem to know where to look. Donaldson gets up from behind his desk.

"I'll leave you two alone."

"No, Father, that's not necessary." He turns to Siobhan. "Could we take a walk?"

x

She's out from behind her desk, crosses the office in a flicker, grabs him and pushes him into the corridor, hurries him to the right down it past Ellen Myers' office, left out the door past the greenhouse and into the garden. The deluge has paused, but she thinks it's gathering its breath for another strike. She doesn't care a bit.

She stops him a few feet into the serene space by the overloaded fountain, her heart slamming hard enough to crack her sternum and a quart of adrenaline making her dizzy because there's nowhere to run to and only her beloved husband to fight.

"Timmy, my heart can't _take_ this! In the Name of God, five words or less: what's _wrong_?"

"I don't think I can say it in five words."

" _TIMMY_!"

"Would you like to go on a weeklong Pacific cruise?"

x

Siobhan feels the blood that had been sprinting through her body drain from her face, chest and probably worse, and while she doesn't suffer mentally she feels every erg of strength drop from her body. Timmy has to grab her arms, carefully back her up and ease her onto the metal bench opposite the overwhelmed fountain.

She tries to get her mind to move from anxiety attack to cruise, but like one of Timmy's computers it crashes rather than resets. She feels her skirt and the back of her blouse drink up two days of rain and vaguely wonders why he put her here - for the bucket of water on the wrong end of her maybe? - but she wishes he hadn't. The bench back is slatted metal, the slightly curved seat is not.

"What?" She'd heard the question - she's pretty sure she had - but she needs to hear it again to ease the reset into something she can control.

That's when the door to her left bangs open and she looks to see George Donaldson warp the twenty feet toward them.

x

"Ellen told me you fainted." The young woman had pulled him out from behind his desk and down the short hall at a dash when she'd yelled it from her office.

"I didn't faint," she sighs.

Looking down into her white face, he decides 'Not completely, but far enough'. He turns to the silent man standing before her, grim and concerned by more now than whatever he'd told her. "Whatever I can do, let me know." He turns to Siobhan. "Meantime, if you have to go, go. Take care of whatever it is first."

"It'll take a few days," Timothy says.

"Let it." He turns down to Siobhan, not liking the vagueness in her emerald eyes. She may not have officially fainted but she's not here by half. If she were, she wouldn't have collapsed into, and stayed in, the shallow puddle on the metal bench. "We're here for you, but take what you need to fix whatever this is."

"George..."

"Yes?"

She shrugs and even manages to make that vague. "Thank you."

He delays a few more moments, but when it's clear Siobhan is recovering and not likely to faint again he leaves the couple to their private plans and concerns.

x

Siobhan is close to recovered from her anxiety (panic?) attack that turned into a Pacific cruise ( _what_?) and had led George to believe some cataclysm had befallen them while she was too busy recovering to correct him. Now she looks up at her husband, knowing that as soon as possible she must clear up this misconception with her partner, but first... "A cuisle?"

"Yes, darling?"

He looks so pleased, probably feeling very good about getting her a week off, all questions avoided. All she feels now is her wet back - horizontal strips of water on her nice blue Clerical dry clean only blouse - and her bum even worse under her skirt because this is _not_ a slatted seat.

"When I can stand up..." 'and die of embarrassment because I have nothing to change into. Thank you so much for the soak.'

"Yes?"

"I am going to throttle you."


	2. Welcome Aboard

Chapter Two  
Welcome Aboard

Commander Adam Bricker M.D., Lieutenant Burl Smith and Cruise Director Julie McCoy usually position themselves in the Pacific Princess' Purser's Lobby on the Promenade deck as the hundreds of guests board. While their attitudes may appear casual, it's a studied, practiced casualness designed to put guests at ease while they perform their duties.

Bricker is a tall man, thin and heading toward eventual gauntness, who revels in his image as the ship's Lothario. Some would say he took up medicine for the opportunities it afforded for close feminine examination until the time comes when he must put those skills to work. Then the mask comes away and the Physician is revealed. As adept in the healing of the heart as of the body, he is also the one first approached when a confidant and advice are needed.

McCoy, particularly at this time, serves as the official welcomer and hostess, facilitator and resolver of problems. She and her staff - which includes the Captain's nineteen year old daughter Vicki - are charged with being certain that guests are attended to, from knowing where their cabins are to providing for their last minute needs. A perpetually young and svelte woman whose pixie hair frames a face the word love was coined for; she is the ship's heart and the one who ensures that the ship's nickname will be felt by her guests. Her staff assists now in the duties of greeting and assigning boarding guests at the two other entrances, one above this deck, the other below. Left to accomplish it alone, even if that were physically possible, she would be able to devote no more than a few seconds to each of hundreds of therefore aggravated guests.

Purser Smith, known to the crew by the descriptive moniker of Gopher, can evoke such an image for its free and fun joy of life in all its forms. He perpetually offers the image of a befuddled man who somehow knows everything that goes on about him. In addition to being responsible for seeing that outstanding balances are settled and additional fees for last minute changes are calculated and agreed upon, he generally makes certain that any reasonable amenities are provided to a myriad of guests.

Commander Adam Bricker views each person as he or she boards, evaluates potential medical needs on the fly and learns who bears watching even before he must become inquisitive.

His Nurse Barbara Copeland performs the same duties on the Fiesta deck, the ship's second most popular gang plank below. It's not a perfect system, but between them they manage to evaluate the majority of the passengers.

That these men and women can perform these varied and highly important duties while appearing to do little more than exchange greetings and small talk is testament to their skill and expertise.

x

A young couple, tall man with blond hair and wire frame glasses and a petite, black haired Asian woman step down from the entryway. They're dressed quite casually as most guests do, blue shirt and tan slacks for him, yellow blouse and blue shorts for her.

"Good morning," Julie says with professional enthusiasm. "Welcome aboard the Pacific Princess." She readies the clipboard containing the alphabetical list of cabin assignments. "I'm Julie McCoy, your Cruise Director. If I may get your names, I'll direct you to your cabin."

"James and Michelle Palmer."

She pages to the appropriate sheet. "Ah, yes. Doctor and Mrs. Palmer. You're on the Aloha deck; that's two levels down on the starboard side, cabin 193." She points to her right to the conveyance beside the port passageway. "You can take the elevator right over there, then cross over to the starboard side."

"Doctor Palmer?" the Commander hadn't missed her emphasis. "Doctor Bricker. Welcome aboard."

"Thank you." They shake hands.

"G.P., or do you specialize?"

"I cut up dead people." He points to the woman beside him. "She makes them that way."

Professional smiles are de rigueur, but Julie's slowly self destructs despite her best efforts. Gopher doesn't do as well; his crashes.

Mrs. Palmer slaps her husband's arm before telling them "I'm a Federal Agent - a non-violent one, I promise. He's a Forensic Pathologist," she sees by Julie's expression that she hasn't gotten through. "A Medical Examiner. When he's not being funny."

" _Oh_."

Julie and Gopher do recover their aplomb quickly, but she feels a twinge of jealousy in that Adam had never lost his.

"Well, enjoy," Gopher says. "No cutting up anything but the steaks now."

"Thank you," they say, looking slightly stunned. Julie struggles to keep her mortification off her own face, suspecting at this moment that the feeling probably means death by embarrassment and expecting the need to be examined by the tall man if Gopher says one more word.

The couple says nothing, however, they just proceed to the elevator, the woman glancing back as though to be certain they're not being followed.

"Medical Examiner and Federal Agent," Gopher says, irrepressible as ever as he turns to Bricker. "I hope you won't need their services."

"Not likely." 'Although Julie might and you almost certainly will," he adds silently. He has no fears for himself, however. As close as it has been on a few occasions over the years, he's never had any guests who hadn't left under their own power.

x

The five women and four men wearing dresses and business suits average in their forties save for one white haired gentleman was could be a very well preserved seventy and another man who could pass for twenty five, while the smallest of the women, at five one, looks young enough that Isaac might have to card her before serving her but that might be an effect of her height. All have the air of long familiarity.

Even before they reach her Julie, who has never met them before, has identified them from forwarded Professional Head Shots and from too many tension filled conversations. The woman at the head of the group is large enough for any two and heads them up like the prow of a ship.

"I'm guessing you're the Hannigan Players," Julie says to the woman she has come to know via telephone as "Mrs. Dale Hannigan?"

"That's right," the black haired woman in the royal blue dress declares imperiously, clearly accustomed to speaking for her party. "You are Ms. McKay?"

"McCoy."

"Of course," she says with the distinct air that Julie may be McCoy if she really wishes to.

Julie turns to her colleagues. "Gentlemen, may I present 'The Hannigan Players' of Miami, Florida?"

"A pleasure," Doctor Bricker says.

"Yes," Hannigan says, then returns her imperious gaze to Julie. "You will escort us to our accommodations."

"Sorry," Gopher says, trying to ease tension the woman has brought aboard as though she's opened a sea gate, "we have no accommodations, only cabins." 'And guests usually find them themselves' is left unsaid.

"Please forgive him," Julie says, "we don't let him out much."

"Yes, I can," the extra large woman silently sniffs, "understand why." She returns her attention to the hostess and commands that "You will assign sufficient Stewards to attend to our trunks and luggage being unloaded from the truck at the dock."

"How much did you bring?" Gopher asks. Normally guests - who do not issue Commands - carry aboard an average of two pieces of luggage each for the week long cruises. With laundry services provided as part of the fare, this is usually sufficient.

For an instant it seems Hannigan is going to ignore the question, then though an inch shorter she says down to him "Only nine Theatrical trunks plus twenty eight pieces of luggage. Just the essentials."

x

Before Gopher can open his mouth to insert another foot into it, very likely with a 'Wow', Julie tells him that "The Hannigan Players are performing tomorrow evening's Dinner Theater." She points to her right to the large sign standing upon an easel near the entrance to the Promenade deck's port passageway beside the curve of the stairs that ascend from their left. The poster board's color scheme is designed to draw the eye to the large announcement.

Glittering silver on black, ornamented with fireworks that fairly burst from the announcement, it proclaims that the group will perform 'Murder on the High Seas' tomorrow evening at 7:00 p.m. in the Acapulco Lounge on the Riviera deck. There will be two repeat performances at Monday's dinner and the Wednesday lunch to allow for sufficient seatings.

Hannigan's is one of the two captioned portraits displayed in the lower corners, the other a light brown haired young woman.

"No, that positively will not do at all!" Hannigan declares in staggering outrage.

"Excuse me?" Julie inquires. Her phone conversations with the imperious woman had rarely gone smoothly but she'd taken copious notes and is sure things have been successfully arranged.

"Look at that sign tucked way over there where no one can see it!"

"Now, Dale," the man standing behind her right shoulder, whom Julie knows from the captioned headshot photos to be Harold McCabe, interjects smoothly, "as one of the five signs we forwarded, I'm sure the Commander and the Lieutenant placed it exactly where the Captain ordered."

"But I'll be very happy to display it more prominently," Adam Bricker offers, crossing the large room to collect the easel. McCabe gives Hannigan a 'there, wasn't that easy?' look.

x

"Not before you remove _THAT_!"

Bricker halts and turns, wonder etched upon his face. The woman is pointing past him to the placard but the outrage in her strongly projected voice has turned every head on the deck.

"I beg your pardon?" He's quite unused to being addressed in such a tone. Commander's rank aside, it is staggeringly rude.

"You _should_ beg." He's about to return to prescribe something less tasty than Caster oil when she hisses through clenched teeth " _Get - that - off - there_."

He glances back at the offending poster but finds no week old squid carcass plastered to it. He looks to Julie for enlightenment but finds none.

He does, however, find it in another woman's face. The light brown haired young woman, the one who looks just out of college, now looks like someone is using a whip on her. She's suffering terribly, more than embarrassment, and her face is slowly crumpling.

He glances to the poster and reads her name on the headshot portrait as Meredith Tate.

At another time he would certainly attempt to get acquainted with her; to ease her distress, preferably with a hug, but this is decidedly not the moment.

" _This_ man belongs up there," Hannigan proclaims in imperious tones that could be heard on the bridge, and the gentleman in question looks no more pleased by the attention, though far less emotionally battered by the loud declaration. " _He_ is the Star."

x

Julie steps out into line between the woman and the poster. She recognizes the man indicated as the star from the forwarded headshots to be Charles Maxwell, credited in the Playbill as the Detective and she hopes she can resolve this tiny faux pas smoothly. Resolving it quietly in Hannigan's presence is unlikely.

"I have to accept-" she cuts off. The petite young woman's humiliation is palpable and a misspoken word like 'blame' or 'responsibility' might shatter her tenuous control. "In reading your Playbill listing the Cred–"

"Those are Legal documents that unfortunately I have no control over. I _do_ have control over this. You will correct your mistake immediately, put up the right picture and _burn_ that!"

At the word burn, it looks to Julie that the woman has driven a stake through the other's heart.

Julie tries to recall every word in the Princess Cruise Line's Employee Manual on the care and accommodation of _all_ guests while at the same time mentally declaring she will do no such thing to the younger woman's very flattering image. In fact, looking at the other picture adhered to the board, she imagines she sees Hannigan's image looking out at her very much like the picture of Dorian Gray.

x

"And how shall anyone _find_ us?" Hannigan demands, moving on to her next protest.

To Julie, who has had too many phone conversations with the woman over the past nineteen days, both ship-to-shore and while in LA, protest, outrage and complaint seem to be the woman's sole methods of self expression, and she makes full use of any actress' training in volume and projection.

'Try Hell's Yellow Pages under 'Harpy'.'

"Oh, don't worry about that," Gopher advises. He's the only one unscathed thus far, so he tries to be the next facilitator.

"Indeed." Hannigan says and Julie wonders where she'd developed the technique of sniffing without an inhalation. Probably in the same place, trying to avoid the sulpher and brimstone.

"No, Madam, every gu–"

"I am _not_ a Madam!"

"Iiiii... beg your pardon." He's never collided with that particular misunderstanding with a guest. "As I was going to point out, every guest is provided with a foldaway map," he glances at his long counter to his right, where fifty of the brochures lie in two neat stacks if a guest should forget or misplace the one sent via mail, "of the entire ship, with copies posted in passageways and elevators."

"You don't say."

Gopher wishes he hadn't. Time to wrap this up; his services must be needed elsewhere - such as in Engineering stoking a furnace. "The ship is laid out with the guests' decks, from lowermost, being Aloha, Fiesta, Promenade where we are now, Coral, Lido, Riviera and Sun. The d-"

" _Only_ seven decks? On a ship _this size_?" She turns to the man at her right and slightly behind who had moderated the last problem. "I _thought_ this was to be a _Luxury_ Cruise ship." There's a definite accusation of failure on the man's part.

Gopher tries his best to clarify. "Accessible to guests, yes Mmmm. Yes, Ms. Hannigan. The deck maps show everything you need to find, including the Acapulco Lounge on the Riviera Deck."

She slams her fists onto rotund hips. "Do you always talk so much?"

x

Bricker, who has probably made all the medical evaluations of this group that he needs to and likely considers prescribing blood pressure medications for both Julie and Gopher, returns from setting the announcement between the elevator and the port Passageway, directly in sight of passengers as they embark but still out of foot traffic.

Julie quickly consults her clipboard. The lists are kept alphabetically but groups are sub-listed for convenience, a practice she now views with the deepest and most heartfelt gratitude.

"Now, I see you're all on the Coral Deck, port side, right up those stairs: Mr. Peter Finch, Cabin 50; Ms. Dale Hannigan, number 60; Ms. Erica King, number 48; Mr. Charles Maxwell, Cabin 52; Mr. Harold McCabe, 58–"

"WHY are all the cabins so spread out?" Hannigan demands. "We reserved ADJACENT cabins!"

"Those _are_ adjacent, Ms Hannigan. You–"

Do not take that tone with _me_ , young lady!"

x

Julie takes a slow breath, clenches her left hand under the clipboard and digs her nails into her palm while reminding herself that Captain Stubing does not like fists used on paying guests.

"No, ma'am," she says in tones that she feels ought to win her a Tony. "You are on the Port side of the ship. All the cabins on Port are evenly numbered such as Ms. Judy Paulsen in number 54; Mr. Michael Simmons, 56; Ms. Ann Stern number 46 and Ms. Meredith Tate-" She pulls herself short.

Meredith Tate, the woman portrayed in the contested headshot, is listed in Aloha 377, lowermost thus three decks down from the others, on the Starboard side and near the stern. She scans the alphabetical sheets with a practiced eye, finds that Adam Cummings is listed in Coral 44 but that he hasn't checked in yet. She squeezes her eyes closed several times, returns to the group listings and squints at the paper. "Doc, you really must check on my contact lens prescription; they were due here yesterday."

"Sorry, I'll get right on it. They'll be here before we sail, I promise."

"Thanks," she looks to the youngest of the women. "Ms. Tate, you're in Coral 44."

Surprised at the depth of surprise on Tate's face, she ignores the hostile glare Hannigan gives her. An actress, she thinks, should have more practice and control over which emotions she shows and how. At least she managed to position them furthest apart in the cluster. The rest of the tour they'll have to work out amongst themselves; but she's already seen enough to expect that's not going to work.

"They're all right up those steps." She indicates the curving staircase behind them with the sincere hope that they'll use it.

x

As the group departs for said staircase, Bricker leans slightly closer. "Good catch."

"Thanks," she whispers. "You too."

"Been married four times. But what was that all about?"

She looks to the poster, from which the Doctor has removed neither picture, then back up to her friend. "I don't _know_. The materials arrived with poster boards, pictures and the little Playbills, but there was no mention of who to put up, so I went with the Company Owner and what I thought was the logical second choice based upon the Playbill. I used the others for the boards in the Lounges and the Pirate's Cove. How was I supposed to know I was starting Pearl Harbor all over again?"

"Look, calm down, forget it. We only have five hundred more passengers to get through."

"Right." But she does take a deep breath and tries to exhale Hannigan.

x

Forwarding a message via a passing Crewman to her staff checking in passengers at the other two entryways about the Tate/Cummings transfer, she turns with a well rehearsed smile to greet the next couple who approach for assignments, a tall brown haired man and a striking redhead.

She tries to morph the mask smile into a genuine one by reminding herself that this couple bears no blame for Hannigan and deserves none of the fallout. In fact they seem a lot nicer, seeing how their smiles are more sincere than hers had been.

He wears a casual brown slacks and sports jacket combo, she a green dress that highlights her fiery locks.

Julie gives her standard welcome, unable to shake the feeling that she recognizes the man, though not from an earlier cruise. Those people she has trained herself to recognize more reliably, aided by a large database well reviewed against the passenger list before each cruise. In fact, no one who has ever sailed with the Pacific Princess before is on this cruise.

x

The man opens his mouth to give his name but Gopher cuts in from the other side of Bricker. "Thom E. _Gemcity_."

She turns, would normally rebuke him for interrupting a guest but his enthusiasm was too great. "What?"

The Purser looks at her like she's grown a second and third heads. "Thom E. Gemcity, the _Bestselling Author_ of Deep Six, Rock Hollow, Cearbhall's Quest and... and..."

"Thus far, that's all of them," the man says, in equal measures flattered and humbled. He is, in fact, deeply into his fourth book, 'The Other Locked Room', and is determined to make great progress this week.

"Six seconds on board," the woman at his side tells him with a honeyed Irish brogue, "and already your cover's blown."

"Shav-"

" _Told_ you it wouldn't work."

"Now? Now you're going to give me your first 'I told you so'?"

"I've given you others, a grá; you just missed them." The Gaelic endearment comes out 'ah raw' to English accustomed ears.

He turns to Julie. "Look, my name's _not_ Gemcity."

"He means on this cruise, honey," his companion interjects kindly, slipping her arm through his.

"Of course, Mr. Gemcity," Smith agrees with a 'Celebrity Secret' wink.

"What is the name you're using this time, sweetness?" the redhead asks him. "I keep forgetting. McGregor?"

His glare by no measure wilts her smile. "Mc _Gee_."

"Oh, yes, that's the one." She looks to the trio. "I really must remember if I'm going to guard him from his legions of adoring fans."

Julie scans the alphabetical list so quickly the pages nearly tear. "Here we are, you're here on the Promenade deck, that's right through those doors, Reverend and Mrs. McGee, Cabin 238."

No one takes note of Meredith Tate, alone and midway up the curving stairs, as she turns from leaning halfway over the rail and hurries upward.

x

" _What_?" the red haired woman on his arm exclaims, her distress sharp. "' _Reverend_ '? How _could_ you?"

"You're traveling Undercover as a _Priest_?" Gopher asks.

She turns to the Purser, enlisting his aid. "Oh, that would never work. Talk about conspicuous!" She turns to the beleaguered man, his arm still entwined in hers. "You in bathing shorts and that funny white collar. And imagine if someone wants you to hear their _Confession_."

"She's right, sir," Gopher says. "Now if you want to be inconspicuous, I recommend-"

With but a thread of patience left, he reaches out. "Ma'am, may I see that list?"

Julie hands it over, hoping for a resolution in this rather than in the Afterlife. He finds the listing with a look of intense disgust and turns to the redhead.

"Someone's going to get Gibbs-slapped."

He hands the board back to Julie, but sounds like he's trying to erase the aggravation from his tone. It's not her fault after all. "It should read 'Reverend and _Mister_ McGee'." He cocks his thumb to the woman at his side. "She's the Reverend."

The red haired woman extends her hand to Julie, the closest one to her. "Siobhan," she greets ber, pronouncing it 'Sha-vawn' in her honeyed brogue.

"Julie." Perhaps this can work out smoothly. The taller woman does seem more at ease than her husband.

"So what are you?" Gopher asks. Julie wants to smack him.

"Jumping overboard." But then he draws up. Julie realizes it's likely because he knows Gopher hadn't deserved the snide answer any more than she'd deserved his frustration. They're trying to do their jobs and straighten out the confusion. "Sorry. I'm a Federal Agent."

x

"Oh, I'd be careful with that one, sir," Gopher says. "We already have one aboard."

Now she truly wishes he'd had kept his peace, preferably somewhere else except this is his Lobby. They'd very nearly resolved everything. The man reaches into his back pocket and pulls out a leather case, shows them his gold _badge_ , then drops ID cards with practiced ease to cover it. "There're going to be a lot more of us. Special Agent Timothy McGee, NCIS."

"Oh, boy," Bricker's tone is a foreshadowing of doom. Julie wonders just how far down one morning can go. NCIS, the Sea Police.

"Oh, I wouldn't let it worry you," Siobhan says kindly, reaches into her purse and pulls out a similar case with a nearly identical shield. "I have one too, except I'm the Chaplain rather than an Agent." So says the bar on the gold metal badge.

"At this rate," Gopher says, "I'm going to need your assistance."

"Guaranteed," Julie says, her tone one of dire warning lest it become Last Rites.

"You say," Bricker says, trying to keep the conversation on track with his concern, "there will be more of you?"

"Five Agents in all, plus guests - and we are on vacation, not here to work. Now you said Promenade 238?"

"Yes, sir," she tells him, anxious to have this over. "Right through those doors."

"See you later," he promises with greater kindness than he'd managed during the confusion.

When they're gone, the three let out pent up breath, disaster averted. Or has it been? The Captain will need to know this ASAP. The good news; there will be only five Naval Agents aboard.

The bad news; there will be five Naval Agents aboard and they've already managed to aggravate the second of them.

x

A gray haired man accompanied by two younger women step onto the deck level and approach with two wheeled cases each.

"Good morning, sir, ladies," she greets them as the younger women flank the man by a half step back, expecting no further greeting this morning could as bad as the last two.

"Gibbs, Leroy Jethro," the man says politely, his smile saying 'I am on vacation and I might even enjoy it', "Sciuto, Abby and David, Ziva"

"Now this is what I was saying," the woman on his right admonishes. Julie can't miss the large spider and web tattoo prominent on her neck and wonders how anyone can sit still through that kind of pain - or would want to. "You're here to _relax_ , and the first words out of your mouth are Name to be closely followed by Rank and Service Number.

"Abby," he tries to chastise her but the woman has already turned her attention to them.

"Please forgive dad. The last time he unwound was before Woodstock."

"Oh, don't worry," Julie says, trying to ignore the glare the man gives his daughter, "you'll all have plenty of relaxation aboard."

"See, father, it is as I told you, "the woman on his left says.

"We may even be able to arrange some companionship," Gopher offers.

"He is quite partial to redheads," the woman assures them, ignoring the glare turned her way.

"I'll see what I can arrange," Julie assures him. "They don't call this 'the Love Boat' for nothing."

Gibbs takes a half step closer, perhaps to clamp onto her attention, raises one finger and gives a slow, firm head shake while the two women, each behind him now, nod in anticipatory affirmation.

x

Their cabin assignments are given, Lido deck starboard, one daughter in the forward of four sections, the other daughter in the second section a few cabins from the father, with no further hardship. They're not especially close but not overly far from one another. Julie has a feeling the man, Gibbs, will settle matters with his daughters later.

She suspects however, knowing this ship's history, that they'll be the ones who'll win.

x

In the meantime she makes a mental note about redheads but excludes the married priest from the list. Not only would it be wildly inappropriate - sort of on the Gopher level of mistakes - but she certainly doesn't want Mr. Gibbs to run afoul of the woman's husband, an NCIS Agent.

Beside this very important consideration, whenever she works to link passengers she tries to keep reasonably within the same generation and Gemcity's - _McGee's_ \- wife looks of an age with Gibbs' daughters.

x

Thinking of young, a young couple approaches from the entryway, whom she greets as enthusiastically as the previous guests. However, the enthusiasm is not reflected in the couple. "Good morning. Joseph and Mary Wagner."

Julie notices before she consults the clipboard that the blonde woman, perhaps 20, looked anywhere but at any face as the introduction was made. "Yes, you're in the Honeymoon Suite; Sun 69. That's four decks up, Starboard side. Take the elevator right there; when you get off cross the deck and turn left into the passageway. It'll be... ten doors down on your right."

"So, _Honeymoon_ ," Gopher says. "Just had the happy day?"

"Yes," the woman says, looking down toward his polished shoes, her voice down on the Aloha deck. "The date was yesterday."

"Sun 69, you said?" Her husband is, if anything, considerably less enthused.

Julie repeats the directions and the couple, carrying their luggage, heads toward the elevator.

"Wow," Gopher says when the doors close, "they look as thrilled to be married as you would, Doc."

"No, Goph, I'd manage to summon up a fake smile until I reached the cabin."

Julie is about to mention a need to keep her eye on these newlyweds when a man and woman approach.

x

"Good morning," the man says with enough élan for themselves, the newlyweds and several other couples. "Anthony DiNozzo and Dr. Jeanne Benoit," he says, presenting the French name as 'Shon Benwa. "I believe we're booked into the Admiral's Suite."

Julie gives him a 'nice try' smile while Bricker presents himself to his colleague, probably confident she can't be another Medical Examiner. She's confident of nothing this morning but she does try.

"I'm sorry, we don't have an 'Admiral's Suite', but we do have," she scans the D's, "Cabins 105," a faster scan to the B's, "and 109 on the Fiesta Deck." She notes each of these are marked with an asterisk. They're one of several potential sets of cabins scattered throughout the ship and the mark shows an activated selection. "They're on the starboard side and they're interconnected cabins, one deck down. Take the elevator over there."

"Fiesta," DiNozzo says to Benoit, his warm tone accompanied by a very significant gleam in his eyes.

#/#/#/#/#

Author's Note: Tim McGee likes to adapt the 'Case Files of L.J. Tibbs' from the real cases of L.J. Gibbs, so 'The Other Locked Room' is taken from the Case File 'Accused', which you will find in my FanFiction dot Net Profile.


	3. Set a Course for Adventure

Chapter Three  
Set a Course for Adventure

"GOOD MORNING AND WELCOME ABOARD THE PACIFIC PRINCESS." The amplified voice fills every internal and external deck of the ship and each Cabin's intercom, at lower volume, with enthusiastic greeting and the promise of wonderful days and nights to come. "This is your Captain speaking," the voice continues with undiminished volume. "We shall sail in twenty minutes so all Visitors are requested to make their way to a gangplank. We will depart Los Angeles and travel south along the California coastline, continue along Baja California Sur before turning East for our first Port of Call in Mazatlán on Sunday morning, 48 hours from now.

"After a half day stay we will depart on Sunday evening for Puerto Vallarta, where we shall also have a twelve hour layover before we return to Los Angeles on Wednesday evening. The weather forecast is for clear skies with temperatures averaging in the mid 80's.

"In addition to our usual amenities, the Hannigan Players will present a production of 'Murder on the High Seas' tomorrow evening at 1900 hours in the Acapulco Lounge on the Riviera deck. Repeat performances will be held on Monday evening and a Matinee performance on Wednesday during the Lunch seating. No tickets are required but seating is First-Come-First-Served."

The blaring horn is both a warning to other ships that the huge vessel will very soon join them in the seaways and a reminder to straggling guests that their clocks are ticking and they must quickly depart or else attempt to purchase tickets.

xx

A half hour later in Fiesta 105, Tony DiNozzo finishes emptying the second of his pair of suitcases, missing his collection of Armani suits and Johnston shoes.

He'd watched the huge white vessel cast off through the porthole in his cabin and slip away from the dock, the shore of Los Angeles receding, for that, rather than anything that had come before, signaled the official start of his vacation.

The white cabin, suitable for a single man who doesn't intend to spend much time alone in it, has little to recommend it. Oh, there's a very comfortable bed with plenty of space on either side - must remember not to fall off during gymnastics, an even more comfortable looking easy chair and a chair set into a small, modern desk, two closets and the Head with shower and other essentials, but beyond these there is little to inspire interest.

Then he hears a soft rap at the door to his left. The door behind him is to the passageway, this one is better. In terms of inspiring interest, there is little that can improve upon it.

He steps over to the locked portal. "Who is it?"

A moment of probably disbelieving silence is followed by "House Call. We understand you have someone in need of Medical Attention."

"Just a minute, Doctor." He turns from the door, gives a double loud stage whisper. "Hide! She mustn't see you or I'll wind up with a week in quarantine."

He waits a slow count of ten, then unlocks the door. "Oh, _hi_ , Jeanne." he greets her with excessive innocence, accentuating the French 'shon'.

It fails because the upper three buttons of her blouse are open, granting him a spectacular view unencumbered by a bra.

He knows there's something he wanted to follow 'hi, Jeanne' with, but for the moment he can't recall what it was to have been.

"Don't worry, honey," she says as she kisses him, her understated French accent especially soft. "It won't be a week."

"No?"

"Succinlycholine works ever so much faster."

x

Having no parry to this outrageous thrust, he decides to go directly to a riposte and kisses her. He draws her in close, unsure in this moment if he wants to devote more effort to sight or to touch.

She looks past him into his room, a reflection of her own. "Done unpacking?"

"You?"

"I never had chance to pack," she declares. "Two hours notice, I threw clothes toward the case and whatever landed inside I closed the lid on. I probably missed with all of my underwear."

"I don't see where that could be a problem, Doctor."

What she would say is cut by the ringing telephone behind her.

"You didn't give your Service the number," he declares, trying to convince himself.

" _I_ don't even know it," she says as she leaves his arms.

x

She reenters the cabin and picks up the receiver of the offending instrument on her white bureau. "Doctor Benoit," she greets, the 'Benwa' sharpened by the interruption. "Oh, _hi_ Abby." The tone is considerably more friendly. "Yes, he is." Tony starts to step in, but Jeanne finger wags him off. "Yes." She looks at her watch. " _Now_?" She looks back to him. "Well, that's true." "Okay. Where is it?" She grins into his consternation. "Sounds fun. Meet you there in ten." She returns the receiver.

"What was that about?" He'd had definite plans, focused by her choice of wardrobe, which hadn't included a phone call ten minutes after leaving the dock.

Jeanne smiles. "Girl talk."

"Girl talk?" He hasn't encountered any in five years that has turned out well for him.

"Yes, darling. I'm to ditch you," she closes the third and second buttons of her blouse while watching the pain in his eyes grow poignant, "and meet Abby on the Aloha deck. _You_ are to go to the Sun deck and wait patiently at the bar while staying stone cold sober for however long it'll take."

If he didn't love Abby so much, he believes his head would explode.

xxx

Isaac Washington is Chief Bartender for the Pacific Princess, a scarlet jacketed black man as cheerful as the beverages he dispenses, who sports a prominent mustache that resembles handles for draft beers.

His love of life is so infectious that some consider Adam Bricker's skills to be needed, and he epitomizes the classic image of the Bartender, the dispenser of drinks, compassion and sagacity.

At this early morning, not quite 9 a.m., he already serves a steady flow of orders to a Sun Deck full of couples taking advantage of the already hot sunlight and the large green clover shaped pool whose varied leaves range from average waist level to seven foot depth. There's a vast array of irregularly placed lounge chairs and small white wrought iron tables flanked by upright padded chairs, and guests either talk in very small groups or lounge in each of these or on the outer edges of the pool's leaves.

The steady breeze of the ship's passage eases the temperature from mid-80's to a very comfortable clime that nevertheless doesn't interfere with fetching fashions.

Bikinis and smaller outfits are the norm, and if feminine pulchritude were sugar the display would be enough to send a hypoglycemic straight into diabetic shock.

In this mix of joie de vivre four men stand out like a dry thumb on a mermaid by virtue of being the only men not taking advantage of pre-tropical fun or the opportunity for sightseeing and staking potential claims on partners for future adventures. To Isaac, they're very evidently well acquainted with one another yet present the air of men who don't want to be here - a corporate meeting cruise? - so they're guests very much in need of his services.

When they wander rather aimlessly upship and into range, he gives them his most fervent welcome. "Gentlemen, what may I get you?"

"We're trying to figure that out," the youngest of them, a reed thin man with gold framed glasses, confesses.

"Well, it it's drinks you want, I'm your man."

"Well, I certainly think we should start here," the slightly older man, as tall with classic Roman features, declares. "I'll have a dry martini."

"Coming right up."

"Dry martini?" the oldest of them asks.

"After the past few days, I'll take anything that's cool and dry. In fact, speaking of cool and not so dry, I wonder how Abby's going to go for a whole week without her 'Caf-Pow!' without swinging from the radar tower."

"Simple, DiNozzo. She brought a couple jars of freeze dried."

"They don't make freeze dried 'Caf-Pow!'," he protests. He'd hit upon that idea for her last birthday but had struck out.

"She does."

x

Gibbs, McGee, DiNozzo and Palmer, having their selections, try to wait patiently for Abby Sciuto's eventually-to-be-sprung surprise. But since by agreement NCIS, Washington, Crime and Investigations are off the table, it renders small talk a large challenge.

Fortunately the Sun Deck offers a wide selection of interesting distractions to four lonely men, one of whom has little prospect of his situation changing, so when conversation lags there's little incentive to start it up again and they spend the time in companionable silence and sightseeing.

That is until Tony, facing the stern and therefore his back to the bar, stops like a character in one of his movie freeze frames, drink half upraised.

x

"Tony?" Tim, the first to notice, wonders if his motionless partner is suffering the onset of a stroke.

"Agent DiNozzo?" Jimmy, having a similar thought though his diagnosis diverges widely from Tim's, remembers that his emergency bag is several thousand miles distant and he has no idea how to summon the ship's Doctor.

Slowly Tony's mouth opens as his eyes grow wider, each part of his face seeming to have no inclination of stopping. Then he surprises his companions by managing the to now thought impossible feat of gulping hard with his mouth hanging open.

His bulbous eyes are locked past his concerned friends and Gibbs glances forward. Attention harpooned and dragged by the taut rope he turns, his motion attracting Tim and Jimmy, and he decides that not only is Tony not suffering a stroke but, given the cause, his reaction is marvelously understated.

x

Abby Sciuto leads Jeanne Benoit, Michelle Palmer, Siobhan McGee and Ziva David from the stern in a line along the starboard side of the clover pool. As the quintet approaches, Tony's malaise is very much contagious to the men whom the five women stroll past.

They column right and stop, three before their particular men, their poses as calculated as their innocent expressions. The breeze catches their hair, three black, one brunette and one red, to add its own spice to the stunning scene.

Abby's attire, though black, is as far removed from her typical Goth fashion as possible yet still originating on the same planet. In the years Gibbs has known her she has worn, under her white lab coat, every conceivable and frequently inconceivable article of outrageous clothing ever concocted in the mind of a psychotic seamstress.

The black bikini she almost wears brings to mind Bermuda style but with, he thinks, considerably less material. The top is very much unequal to its task and below only the fact that she keeps herself trimmed to within a very indulgent bat outline tattoo protects her from a red face such as on his stunned companions.

Fortunately he is too mature to be taken in by feminine wiles or displays.

x

Doctor Jeanne Benoit wears, if the word can be stretched to apply to this suggestion of a bikini, blue. However the little wisps of fabric that attempts to claim the name are a French string combination with adjustable cups and equally spreadable / collapsible bottom. Gibbs is sure she can monitor Tony's pulse from where she stands.

Michelle's shocking scarlet bikini looks like it at one time considered being legal in a few countries before it firmly changed its mind and threw caution - and decorum - to the wind.

She still wears her sterling five pointed star within a circle and surrounding a cross, but it's displayed because there's too little with which to hide it.

The small suit is mesh, a woven mesh that's slightly lightened by her body yet the hundred holes are so small that it teases at more than it offers. Someone would have to be very close indeed to attempt to see through it.

He never intends to get that close.

x

The emerald bikini Siobhan McGee wears is similar to her friends', yet enough to force him not to look for too long at the married redhead.

She is, in fact, wearing the most secure example of outrageous attire such as her fellow conspirators almost wear. While small enough to be staggering for a woman whose idea of casual dress-down is slacks and blouse, she allows no slippage. The other women wear far riskier fashions which can make them victims of stray breezes or waves, their very brief garments titillating because of the potential for accidental over-exposure.

In other words, in spite of the suit's brevity, Siobhan will show exactly as much as she wants to and not an inch more.

x

Ziva goes to what seems the opposite extreme until one looks closely, as the suit is designed to make men do. Up top it appears as a single band which opens to cup one breast, crosses up her chest and behind her neck to cross down and open to cup her other breast. It seems only Ziva herself, and prayers or great luck, hold the band in place, that one strong breeze would make it sail over the rail beside her or else be carried upward on said gust to wrap itself around the rotating radar tower.

However on closer examination - and the garment does need closer examination - almost invisible microfilament strands secure the material between her breasts and around her back - but one must risk great hazard to get sufficiently close to the woman to break the illusion.

The same can be said for the small black bottom half that hides her front and back while invisible filaments are all that secure her at bare hips.

Seeing the male members of his team, he considers them as affected as he must confess to be, though he has far greater control of his expression than do any of the younger men, who must carefully try to limit the range of their observations to straight ahead.

It's well the three have a Naval connection, for the only word that applies to them is 'torpedoed'.

x

"Trying to bring every man north of Cape Horn down in flames, Abs?" Gibbs challenges. Her selection of baseball uniforms for the recent 'Shirts vs. Skins' game had been outrageous. This blows that choice out of the water.

"We told her," she says, referring to the store clerk, "we only wanted to see what no other woman on this ship would dare to put on, then to cut that material by half," Abby declares.

"When that turned out to be impractical," Jeanne says, "since there's nothing the woman on this ship won't dare, we settled for 'scandalous slutty'."

"No, we didn't," Siobhan protests. Hers, provocative though it is, is the only one that doesn't leave her in danger of accidental exposure. What she'll expose to her husband later is her business.

"Anyway," Abby picks up, "we decided that since we're totally off duty, we've got it and we're gonna flaunt it."

Michelle smiles up to her staring husband who is wise enough to confine his searchlight beams to her. "I picked up one for tomorrow that's _way_ hotter than this one."

"I can hardly wait," he says, his voice rough and an octave too deep. If the almost see-through mesh can be exceeded, he might not survive.

"If you're good - or especially if you're bad - I might model it for you tonight." Her eyes promise him considerably more, certainly more than the others should hear.

x

"You've created a monster, Abs," Gibbs warns.

"We don't know what the married couples will do on this trip," Abby declares, a dreadful lie as she steps around to stand beside the equally stunning Ziva, both their black outfits enough to sear eyeballs, "nor can we speak for those in a committed relationship," she says with a glance to Jeanne and the staring and staggered Tony, "but Jenny ordered us to relax this week and Ziva and I intend to enjoy this vacation. We've matched for this ship; she's trolling Port, I'm trolling Starboard and we _intend_ to get laid."

To this there can be no response, at least none which any dare to voice.

xx

Jimmy Palmer steps up to the Sun Deck's bar; he and 'Chelle hadn't made much progress touring the ship after the spectacular surprise of an hour ago. They prefer for this morning to lounge by the clover pool while overlooking the ocean and he's been discreetly testing the translucency of her scarlet mesh. He does have to be very close indeed to see through the hundred tiny holes but she doesn't seem inclined to stop him.

He's able to wear shorts this morning since she'd helped him disguise the thin horizontal bruises on his shins with some of her make up before they'd left the hotel. Little could be done about the scratches on his forearms, only to hide the ones on his chest with his tee shirt. He's grateful no one had asked about the ones on his forearms but he suspect the men were also being discreet. The problems 'Chelle and he have been having are the second worst kept secret in NCIS; the very worst one had been their incendiary love affair before incendiary had adopted a whole new and unpleasant meaning for them. It will take some time for the scratches inflicted on Tuesday to heal, but the horizontal bruises inflicted by 'Chelle's shoes are hidden, provided he stays out of the water.

It seems like everything about their relationship, both the good and the bad, has been incendiary. But he prays that this cruise will be what they need to recover what they'd had, for if they keep on this path they'll either have the most incredible stories to tell their grandchildren or their marriage won't survive the year.

x

Now while 'Chelle waits reclining in a chair, her hint of a scarlet bikini and her promise for later quite bad for his eyes and he's finding the inspection of the material to be thirsty work, he approaches the small bar and the red jacketed black man, Isaac Washington. There's already a young blonde woman at the bar, the first woman he's seen aboard this ship who looks depressed.

"That's really terrible," Isaac says.

"What is?" The words are out of his mouth before filters like 'rude', 'intrusive' and 'none of your business' can save him. Fortunately neither turns an annoyed face to him. After receiving a sad nod, Isaac relays the bad news.

"This young lady and her fiancé were scammed out of their wedding."

Having not let the malfunctioning filters interfere before, he plunges ahead. "How?"

The blonde woman turns red eyes to him. It's very obvious she's been crying, likely for some time, but apparently sees him as a friendly ear. If possible, he'd love to be a White Knight as well. Within reason, of course. Can't let 'Chelle get the wrong idea.

"Joe and I were all set to get married two days ago when the _priest got arrested_."

"Arrested?"

"Arrested!"

"For what?"

"For not being a priest." He tries to work through this one so she rescues him. "We found him on the Internet. He seemed okay but he was scamming people. He'd married all these people who now aren't really married. We didn't get married, but all the arrangements - the Hall, the Reception, the Plane trip from Missouri, this Cruise in the Honeymoon Suite, all Shot To Hell."

Her capitals come through so well but he decides to try for a bright spot. "But you're here. You may not be married but you're here."

"We've lost all those deposits in addition to not being married. Joe suggested we go through with this even if we did get screwed out of the real thing."

"That's tough." But then the obvious solution, like a message from God, hits him. "You know, there _is_ a Priest aboard this ship."

"Hey, yeah!" Isaac realizes, getting into the spirit. "I remember hearing about her from Gopher."

"Who's Gopher?" she asks.

"One of the crew. Never mind. But this passenger, she's a priest."

x

"A _woman_ priest?" she demands skeptically. "Is she for real? I'm not going through this shit again."

"She's the real thing," Jimmy swears. "She's from DC, all legitimate."

"You're sure?"

"Yes. She married my wife and I."

"She did?" Skepticism rockets upward and explodes into suspicion. "And now she's here with you?"

"Oh, no, it's not like that. No, we've been married for months, but we're all on this, well, kind of a corporate vacation, sort of. And she's our Chaplain."

Suspicion dims enough for her to be willing to hear more. "Who is she?"

"Mother Siobhan McGee. I don't know what cabin she's in but you can look it up. She's a priest at Saint Mary the Virgin Church, New York Avenue, in Washington DC. You could even Google her."

"And she'd agree to marry Joe and me?"

"Uh, wait a minute, guys," Isaac cautions.

"You should ask her."

"I'm not so sure this is–"

"Thanks, I will." She's off the stool, hurries for the far exit, leaves Jimmy and Isaac in her wake.

The red jacketed man turns to his remaining customer. "I'm not so sure that was such a good idea."

"Why not?"

"Well..." Why not? "Well, if I was going to marry someone, I'd want to be asked."

It sounds lamer aloud than when it was in his head.

"What can it hurt for her to ask?"

"That's true, I guess. Just to ask." He sets the matter aside. "What can I get you?"


	4. Trouble on the Lido Deck

Chapter Four  
Trouble on the Lido Deck

Siobhan McGee, quite unaware of having been a subject of intense discussion, surfaces from the deepest part of the long pool at the stern on the white ship's Riviera deck. She's managed to swim the length of the crystal clear pool underwater for a circuit and a half before pressure in her lungs forced her up. Progress is slow and complicated because she must navigate among quite a few legs so, no matter how she pushes off, she can't make good time.

She'd held up this long in the attempts because Timmy is stretched out in a lounge chair, back to her and head by the pool's high edge. The pool is filled so high she could swim over and talk to him at head level, but she decides to continue swimming. She'd set a personal goal of three underwater laps between the other frolickers and wants to keep trying until she either makes it or is forced to give up.

At this point she'd declare herself satisfied if she could just complete two through the human obstacle course.

Further, she doesn't want to disturb Timmy. She's morally certain her husband is sightseeing while she swims laps deep under the water, but she's confident that no matter who he chooses for closer examination, or however many investigations he conducts, he'll return to the cabin with her.

In fact, she'd be inclined to feel his forehead with her wet hand if he's _not_ checking out the selection of imaginary prospects like a secret bachelor.

But when she looks this time and sees the tableau a few yards away, she decides he must either be asleep - his loss for she'd generously allowed him the chance for naughty dreams - or else he has his eyes closed like a good newlywed husband should, because there is no way that he can ignore this.

x

Four feet beyond him a woman of about twenty years stands, a short stack of white papers clutched in her left hand, apprehension etched on her face and shining in her eyes. She takes a step toward Timmy, halting abruptly, so fearful she ought to be making additional waves in the pool Siobhan floats in.

She wears a white halter and shorts combination and her shoulder length light brown hair is blown to her left by the ship's steady breeze. She inches forward, half reaches out and drops back half an inch before forcing courage into her reach, but then she loses a full step against her half step to Timmy.

She clutches the already thoroughly wrinkled papers tightly, and with every false start and frightened retreat she finds a new way to clench them. The floating woman decides that if she's here seeking an autograph from the 'Bestselling Author', she probably won't be able to read the paper by the time she gets it.

Siobhan swims in and grasps the pool edge, all unnoticed. Timmy must indeed be asleep, else how could he miss the fearful blasts that roll over her even against the chaotic currents of the other swimmers behind her? She lets the petite woman fall through several more seconds of anxious desire, the net result leaving her two feet further back than when Siobhan had surfaced.

"It's okay," she says, regretting it when her voice makes the girl jump half out of her skin before she sees her. "He won't bite," she assures her with a grin, seeing Timmy stir on the lounge. "And if he does, I'll bite him."

x

It's to this outlandish declaration from his wife that Tim McGee returns to the ship and he rolls over left, looks 'up', now within inches of his wife's wet head, her red hair plastered back. " _What_?"

"I think you have a fan, a chumann," she says, the Gaelic 'sweetheart' sounding as 'ah hom-un' to English accustomed ears. Her emerald eyes gaze past his shoulder.

Tim turns back over and looks 'down' to find an utterly mortified young woman standing six feet beyond the end of his lounge chair. She clutches a crumpled stack of papers, a pen and dread worse than he remembers feeling at his first firefight. "Yes?"

"I'm so sorry, sir!" she exclaims as though she'd singlehandedly ruined his life or sank the massive ship. "I - that is I–! I wasn't going - I'm really sorry, sir - I didn't think - I didn't mean to disturb you. You - you probably wouldn't help me anyway! I'm - I'm sorry. I'll leave you alone!" She pivots right and gets a quarter step into her dash.

" _ **STOP**_!"

He's half proud when she turns to stone. It had been a command worthy of Gibbs - until he glances about and sees that everyone within a fifteen foot radius has obeyed.

x

Rather than speak to them and risk losing the effect - they'll work out who he'd called to - he pushes out of the lounge chair and steps in front of the petrified girl. Her eyes as she tracks him up - he's a foot taller than she is - are filled with fright at war with terror and beaten senseless by panic.

"My wife is right," he says as kindly as he can manage, with a glance back to the woman resting her chin on her crossed arms on the pool ledge before returning to those blue eyes so assaulted by terror. "I don't bite. And I do try to help." He indicates with a gesture the vacant long webbed lounge recliner to the left of his own and she comes with him on stiff limbs, sits down as though she might break.

"Honey," Siobhan says as she floats left to midway between the seated couple who face one another across a chasm of terror, "it's true. He'll help you if anyone can."

"I saw you when you checked in," the girl admits, her voice breathy and shaking. "I recognize you're not Thom E. Gemcity - exactly." She looks about, hunting for inspiration, and confesses with crashing shoulders that "I don't even know what to call you."

"Tim McGee," he extends his hand and three seconds later she realizes it's not going to bite her so she takes it. The woman between / beside them shakes out her hand and extends it.

"Siobhan McGee. Pardon the wet."

"It's okay. You're a Priest? I overheard, when you came aboard just after me," she confesses, ashamed at how thoroughly she'd intruded into their lives this morning and particularly now.

"Yes, I am."

She realizes she should let go of the woman's hand, does so and looks from one to the other, then focuses on the man before her. "May I tell you why I'm here?"

"I think that'd really help."

x

"Sorry. I'm with the Hannigan Players. I'm Meredith Tate. At least I hope I'll still be, even if it's just for a little while longer."

"Excuse me?"

She plays back her words into their confusion. " _Oh_. No, I don't mean I'll only be Meredith Tate a while longer. That's my name. I mean I may only be with the Players a while longer the way I'm fucking up lately. OH!" she cries, her hand pressed to her lips as she looks to the floating priest on her right. "I'm _sorry_. I didn't mean that."

"Forgiven."

She sighs heavily. "I'm really messing this up. I _knew_ I would."

Tim doesn't want her third guessing herself out of a coherent answer. Right now coherence is a struggle in which the three of them are barely holding their own in. "Listen, does this have a beginning a little further back?"

"Yes."

x

x

After a too long silence Siobhan asks "Would you like a drink?" She raises her arm to attract the woman bartender from beyond the pool's end.

"Oh, no, you don't want me around alcohol. That's when I set Olympic Records for fu- for fouling up."

Siobhan cancels the signal. Fortunately the uniformed woman hadn't come far from her post.

"Miss Tate?"

"Yes, sir?"

"Take a deep breath and tell us."

She takes his direction literally, but she does enter the story. "I've been with the Players for eleven months, but I've been on probation. Hannigan, she sets all the rules and one rule is every member, to become a full member, has to produce by the end of the first year a script of a minimum of a half hour from scratch with no help at all."

She looks away left, visibly forces herself to return, to meet his eyes. "Well, 'Murder on the High Seas' is mine and we're premiering it tomorrow evening in the Acapulco Lounge."

"Congratulations." They'd seen the sign when they'd boarded and had decided to give it a miss. Murder is work, not relaxation, but he certainly won't say to the author that they don't intend to see her work.

"It's _CRAP_!" she cries as forcefully contained tears break through. "Absolute Crap!"

"It can't be all that bad," he says, expecting this is the Writer's version of stage fright and that reassurance will help. He's known many writers who are their own most vicious critics. "They're performing it tomorrow."

"Yes!" She wipes her eyes with too much force, forces the rest of her tears back. "We're under Contract. We have to perform it. But I've had the most horrible Writers Block. For _weeks_. Have you ever had Writers Block?"

x

He could tell her stories, particularly about 'Rock Hollow' and the nightmare that had resulted from that, but he'll leave off hyperbole. "Yes."

" _Nothing_ I write comes out. It's like I'm stuffed up. All I have-" She fights the tears back again. "All I have is this crappy first draft," she says, shaking the papers viciously. "No one can help me because in the Players it's sink or swim so I have to come up with a totally new thing by this evening for everyone to learn by tomorrow night or we do _this_ ," she grinds the papers in her hands, "everyone will be humiliated by this crap and I'll be fired for humiliating them and Hannigan is going to take everything out on me and I'm going to be Blacklisted for presenting this shit for them to perform and writers don't have steady declared income and my income from the Players there's no payments to Unemployment so if I'm fired I have nothing to–"

"Is this your primary job?" he interrupts to break her breathless rush before she revisits incoherence.

"What company would let an employee take off for a theater or a ship, especially when we travel all over the country?" She can't meet his eyes, stares at her lap, shaking her head. "She won't pay me for this and I'll probably not even be able to-. She'll fire me and then since I won't be a Player she'll make me pay for this trip instead of paying me. I can't afford this, the passage and extras like Room Service comes to more than my salary would be so she'll put me off in _Mexico_ and..."

Her voice is stolen by anxiety and grief, though she won't break before this couple.

x

Siobhan makes her voice soft. "Meredith?" The devastated author visibly forces her hopeless grief back, looks to her. "May I call you Meredith?" She nods. "You're booked to give this play on the second day but this is a six day cruise. Why not go to the Captain? Explain. I'm sure he'd try to accommodate you." When she sees the girl waver, she says "I could help you."

"How?"

"I have a certain connection with the Captain." She avoids Timmy's eyes. _Jennifer_ _Shepherd_ has an undefined 'certain connection' with Merrill Stubing, whom they haven't met yet, enough to get them aboard at virtually the last minute, but she has a connection to Jennifer, who wants this trip to go smoothly.

She doesn't look at Timmy, doesn't want to see him cringe.

"I _can't_! We're doing three performances, tomorrow evening, Monday and Wednesday."

"Oh, right, I forgot."

"I thought with a few more days, miss tomorrow, some miracle, I could do it. She won't do it. It's either tomorrow evening or I'm in default on my Contract. I'm fired, lose my Nest, get Blacklisted–"

"And no one can help you, even seeing the script's problems?" Siobhan asks. She shakes her head. "She'd let the entire Company fail?"

"Yes."

"Does this woman hate you so much?"

Her head drops. "Yes."

x

"Meredith?" When Tim pulls her back up "Why did you come to me?"

"You're such a great Writer. New York Times Bestseller. I thought- I hoped- I thought... maybe you'd look–? Maybe you'd be willing to–. Maybe you'd look at it and tell me where I went wrong?" She looks from one to the other, desperation exhausted. Her eyes fall. "I'm sorry. I know I have no right."

Tim looks to his wife, sees the answer in her eyes that he knew would be there, that he'd always known he would give. He reaches out to Meredith. "Give it to me."

x

Her head flies up, her doom reversed so violently he imagines it must have hurt. "You're-!"

Every time she'd tried to appeal for help she'd second and third guessed herself so to get it must really be tongue tying. But he's known the pain of Writer's Block when facing the dreaded Deadline. He will not allow a fellow Writer to be abused over it.

He takes the crumpled papers from her and smoothes them out. "What cabin are you in?"

"Coral 44."

He takes her pen from her, writes the note on the title page and looks at his watch. "I'll look these over, meet you in your cabin at 1400, give you my thoughts." She returns a blank expression. "2:00."

"You're going to–! _Thank you_!" She launches herself out of the lounge, arms about his neck, her kiss as powerful as it is surprising. But then she yanks back, her eyes flash to the floating woman. "I'm sorry! I'm so _sorry_! I don't know what–!"

Blushing furiously, she whirls and runs away so quickly she's at the companionway, down it and out of sight before he's thought of anything to say.

xxx

Commander Adam Bricker, Lieutenants Isaac Washington and Burl (Gopher) Smith and Cruise Director Julie McCoy have finished lunch in the Pirate's Cove and now enjoy a casual digestive stroll on the Lido deck. They cross through the second common area that connects the second port and starboard passageways, cabins 101 through 200, when they see two women burst through the double doors at the head of the starboard passageway.

They've passed scores of passengers and exchanged casual greetings with each on the slow walk but these two are notable because, of all the emotions commonly expressed by relaxing passengers aboard the Pacific Princess, terror is not one of them.

The women see the uniformed quartet. "Oh please help!"

"What's wrong?" Bricker asks. They're still about thirty feet apart.

"There's a woman being Murdered back there!"

" _What_?" They dash to the pair.

"Oh, down the hall, you can hear the most horrible screaming!"

When Bricker and Washington shove the doors aside it's as the women said. A horrendous shriek blasts up the long passage that extends a quarter the length of the huge ship. "Stay out here!" Bricker commands the women.

"Shouldn't we get help?"

"Yes. Find anyone in the crew and send them." He leads the charge as another scream blasts up the corridor.

They cannot run too fast for fear of overshooting the intermittent cries. Julie pulls from her blue uniform jacket her Smart Phone containing the passenger lists. While the paper lists are better for Check-ins, this is more convenient.

Another scream tells them they did overshoot - that one came from behind them.

"This one!" Gopher exclaims. "L-123!"

"Shouldn't we get Security?" Isaac asks as Julie rapidly punches in the Cabin ID.

"No time. We three can handle whoever it is," Bricker barks. "Julie, you help the woman."

"Right."

He hopes there's someone left for him to treat when another long shriek blasts through the door. Bricker pounds hard and fast.

"Ms. David?" Julie calls. "Ms. DAVID, is everything all right in there?" She feels it's the stupidest question she's asked all year but there are no more screams from within. There are no sounds at all. "Ms. _David_?"

x

The lock clicks off, the door opens a foot and the men are tensed to leap but a woman's head appears, low and nearly horizontal so she's evidently bent at the waist. All but Isaac Washington recognize her as Leroy Gibbs' daughter, but she's considerably worse for wear. Her black hair is disheveled, her bare left shoulder rises and falls with her heavy breaths and she whispers "It is Da-veed. Ziva Da-veed."

The door slips open a bit further and the woman catches it with her left hand. She holds her black bikini to her breasts with her right. It's a very awkward covering.

"I'm sorry, Ms. David," Julie says, willing herself not to blush. They've so obviously misinterpreted too much. "Is everything all right?"

Okay, second stupidest question of the year, and it's only mid-July.

The woman smiles. "It is getting there." She jumps, her eyes widen as she gasps sharply. "Ah. The screaming. I am very sorry."

David's eyes flash as, bent over, she nearly drops the material because of whatever is being done out of sight behind the bulkhead. The men back away, leave her alone. 'Thanks, guys.'

"We will try not to disturb anyone."

"Sorry to disturb _you_. Go, err, back to your gentleman."

Ziva jumps with a sharp gasp, eyes virtually flying from her head, but then she smiles up at her. "He is no gentleman."

She pushes the door closed and the lock goes back on.

Julie turns to her cowardly companions, not pleased to have been abandoned. "Well, that was perfectly embarrassing."

x

They start back up the passageway and the double doors at the far end burst inward. Four white and black uniformed men charge down the passageway to be brought up short by Bricker's upraised hands.

"It's all right," he calls. "False alarm. You can go back to your stations."

When they're gone, Bricker says as they continue up the passageway much more slowly than they'd entered it, "It _was_ perfectly understandable. I confess it had me fooled."

"I haven't heard screaming like that," Gopher says, "since the day I set 'Nightmare on Elm Street' 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 playing on five different sets."

"You scare me sometimes, Gopher," Julie tells him as they approach the double doors. "Though I _can_ see where she was coming from. I like to let off a little scream every once in a while." She doesn't care for the leers her friends give her. "Though not the full bodied bust a gut and dent the bulkhead ones."

"That's good to know," Smith assures her, holding his leer.

"The day I scream around you, Gopher, they _will_ call Security."

His leer collapses. "That's good to know too."

"Though this could become a problem," Isaac warns. This early in the day, most passengers are not in their cabins.

"Her father and sister are both aboard. I could talk to the sister."

"Not the father," Bricker suggests, recalling the man's stern reaction to his daughters' teasing.

"Nooooooo." As they pass through the swinging doors a bloodcurdling shriek, muffled halfway through, chases them. Though they look back, no one moves to assist. " _Definitely_ talk to the sister."

"Riiiight," Isaac concurs.

xxx

Siobhan McGee continued her underwater swim in the rectangular Riviera deck pool, determined to push to make three circuits submerged in the too crowded pool, but when her lungs hurt she surfaces occasionally to check her husband's progress. When she sees he's reached the last page she swims to the ladder, climbs out and, toweling herself with a white double large fluffy, walks around the pool with it, lays down in the web lounge chair to Timmy's left and deposits the towel on the small table on her left.

She stretches out in the long webbed lounge to let the hot sun and the breeze of the ship's passage complete the job of drying her emerald bikini. She keeps her hands closed so Timmy won't spot her waterlogged fingers before they can return to their normal attractive state.

Timmy has put his head back onto the webbing, is certainly aware she's beside him but he doesn't open his eyes. She gives him twenty seconds. "So. What do you think?"

"I've learned one thing about Miss Meredith Tate," he says, staring at his eyelids.

"After that kiss, I'd expect you'd know a lot about her." He turns his head, looks at her with only one eye, never a good sign. She lets her teasing smile fade. "What did you learn?"

"That she's an honest woman." He uses both eyes, raises the script. "This is crap."


	5. Rule Number 57

Chapter Five  
Rule Number 57

"Is it really that bad?" Siobhan asks of the rumpled script but immediately changes her mind. Though she'd had aspirations as a teenager, she's not the Writer.

She surreptitiously presses the lower half of her emerald bikini, forces some of the water out to fall through the webbed slats of the lounge chair. Her hair and body will dry quickly in the hot sun and breeze - she'd made sure her hair was matted straight back until she reaches a shower - but the water from her bikini will flow in rivulets down her body if she has to get up.

"Horrible."

"What's wrong with it?"

"I knew who the murderer was on the page of the killing, it was too obvious. Only one person could benefit from the death, only that person was in position to have the murder weapon, a large steak knife. She was the only person with a potential motive and her alibi was laughable.

"Then it's ten pages of the detective fouling up Interviews - well, I have to give her that one since she's not likely to have ever done an Interrogation - but he also mishandles clues and evidence or is completely oblivious that he has them or to their meanings as the story drags because he's the only one who can't see the killer.

"It's not funny enough to be a comedy or sharp enough to be a satire. The audience will start throwing their deserts at the actors by page 13."

x

She lays quietly, tries to devise an idea, knows he'll say these things to her which he'd never say to Tate - not like this. "Isn't one of Jethro's infamous rules something like the only possible suspect being innocent?"

"Rule Number 31: The only one who could've done it probably didn't." He leans back in the lounge and stops, staring up at the rotating radar panel high above.

She picks up her head. "A cuisle?"

He's staring, a statue except for his breaths.

She rolls over to him. He hadn't looked like this even when she and the others had walked out onto the Reveal Stage. "A rún?" To him 'my dear' would sound like 'ah ruin' for so at this moment does he look.

x

In an explosion of motion he sits up, a hard pull on the armrests launches him from the lounge chair and, clutching the papers, he double times across the deck. Siobhan pulls herself up, snatches the double fluffy from the small table beside her and hurries after him on bare feet. She wraps the large towel about her - the green bikini's soaked and water trickles down her half dried body - and she hopes she's not as much of a spectacle as she feels she is, long red hair plastered down her back and the white towel clutched about her.

She doesn't quite catch him, having to be careful even on the companionway until they're on the Coral Deck. Then they're in the port side passageway and she can make time on the carpet, runs to catch up with his longer strides. "Honey, what are you doing?" He's so focused he may not even be aware of having charged away and left her trailing his wake.

"Following my favorite Rule, Number 57. 'If you have to break someone else's rules, break them'."

x

He raps on the door to Cabin 44, a rapid series of staccato strikes. Seconds later the door swings open but the woman barely has chance to get out of his way.

He's past her and in the room, riding what's left of his rush, but whatever he was about to say to the startled young woman is replaced with "What the heck is this?"

The cabin is crammed full with nine huge black trunks, each one big enough for a man to get inside, leaving precious little room to squeeze between.

Having trouble looking at him, Meredith admits "I'm responsible for all the props and wardrobe."

'No one should live like this.' "What's wrong with the ship's Hold?"

"Honey," Siobhan calls from the open door, trying to keep her tone soft. This is none of their business. But she looks about the packed room. Each trunk is above waist high to her, more so to Tate, and she changes her mind. It may be none of her business, but if anyone tried this with her they'd regret the failed attempt. Tate clearly needs to speak up. The nine trunks only allow a tight path to the bathroom. "I think the ship's Officers would consider this a fire hazard."

Seeing the color drain from Tate's face Tim shakes his head, a definite signal to his wife to 'drop it'. "Never mind." He faces Tate directly. "I'm sorry to burst in on you like this but I had something that couldn't wait. When an idea hits me-"

"Yes! Please, don't apologize. I'm amazed you got here so fast, and if you can help, even a little," she says, her confidence decaying, "that is, if you would I'd really..." She runs herself out.

"Are you a fast typist?" he asks to ease her distress. He won't tell her his Rule 14: 'If you don't ask for help, you won't get it.'

Siobhan steps in at a more civilized pace, reforms the huge towel into a faux dress from above her breasts to her knees, her expression still apologetic at their spectacular intrusion. She tries to find a space to fit into. The cabin is a single, half the size of theirs and is roomy enough in sane situations, but with three adults and nine tremendous trunks...

Perhaps she should leave? No. She thinks that'd only embarrass Tate further rather than help. Besides, she may yet be able to get a chance to talk, when Timmy is done, about putting one's foot down. Otherwise, she is going to have a talk with someone else on the subject of fire hazards.

x

Tate finally recovers enough to process that he'd asked her a question. "Ah, ye– Yes. I - I guess so."

He sees an open laptop on the table to his left and a chair scrunched between two trunks but with virtually no elbow room. Good thing she doesn't use a typewriter like he used to; it used to keep Shav awake so she'd bought him a pocket sized writing computer. A new blank Word document is open on this laptop. "Good. Try to keep up."

She runs to the device, manages to squeeze into the hole and jocky her chair in under her. There's less than an inch of space on either side of the seat. He won't tell her that by this point one or both of those trunks would be tethered to the stern, tugged along on the waves. "Interior, Acapulco Lounge. A dinner party is underway when there's a loud commotion at the entrance."

xxx

In the Excelsior Room on the Promenade deck the band plays slow tunes on the small black stage framed by dozens of light bulbs that make the raised section look like a dressing room mirror. The mellow music allows couples on this early afternoon to dance very close together and Anthony DiNozzo and Jeanne Benoit are not hesitant in taking full advantage of the chance for enhanced intimacy.

"Doctor, this is one of your best prescriptions. "

"Well, speaking as one who had nothing to do with it, I thank you."

"I thank you. Without you along, this cruise would be six days of lonely agony."

"A ship with hundreds of nubile wenches, all of–"

"Wenches?" he laughs.

"Hey, it's your script. So as I was saying, on a ship with hundreds of nubile wenches, all of–"

"Nubile?"

"whom have an aversion to more than ten ounces of clothing, I don't think you would have suffered _too_ much."

"Au contraire, my image of a perfect week would be eighteen servings of Room Service alternated with intense exercise."

"Not on your life, Mister DiNozzo; you roped me–"

"Mister?"

"You are not an Agent for this week. And as you roped me into this cruise, I intend to enjoy it."

"Guaranteed. When we get to Mazatlán day after tomorrow I am going to show you some places you've never dreamed of. Places the tourists never go."

"I'm going to hold you to that."

"You do that." He turns her about to a beat in the music. "Meantime, about those ropes..."

xxx

"I'm sorry."

"For what?" Michelle Palmer asks as she sits at a small table side by side with her husband on her left in the dimly lit 'Pirate's Cove' bar, the 17th Century decorated wall behind them, drink glasses before them. It's closing on mid-afternoon and she had just started to wind down from a very full day when her husband said those terrible words that stabbed her spirit.

"A lot. Everything."

"No."

"No?" He sounds like that wasn't what he was expecting.

" _No_. Capital N, capital O. NO! No more apologies. No more regrets. _No more_. I am _done_. We made up, cleared a lot of air between us. We're getting out of Kenilworth and going back home the minute we dock. I'm not going to rehash any of our fights, any problems, _nothing_. Clean slate. You've done nothing wrong, I've done nothing wrong. The past is over and I am not getting into any more fights. Agreed?"

He picks up his glass. "Agreed." They clink, drink, set down and she cuddles against his side. "I'm sorry."

She comes up with an aggravated sigh, turns on him, teeth gritted. "You - don't - freakin' - _Listen_."

"This isn't old, this is new."

"All _Right_!" She sees another couple in the small room turn but doesn't give a damn, doesn't lower her voice. "All right, but after this, nothing more. _What_ are you sorry about?"

"The top of your blouse was wide open and for the past twenty minutes I've been staring at your breast."

She looks down, but in her movements her blouse is perfect. "You can't see my breast."

"Why do you think I'm sorry?"

She puts her head back against the wall, hand to her forehead, and sighs "When we get back to our cabin I am going to do the most awful things to your body."

"Then why are we sitting here?"

She picks her head up, considers. "You're right, why are we sitting here?"

They take their glasses with them, anticipating being very thirsty later.

xxx

The sun has set into the Pacific upon a very long day for Gibbs and his extended team and guests, but they, as a signal honor, have been invited to seats at the Captain's Table, so the group is dressed accordingly. He's pleased that each of his extended crew has scrupulously observed Rule Number 29, 'Anticipate every possibility' or in this case, with a mixed team, would Boy Scout Number 1 be credited? The ship's male officers are in formal white uniform jackets with epaulets, the agents in suits and the women in a variety of very fetching dresses. Seating, aside from paired partners, has crew and guests mingled.

The Captain's Table on the main level of the dining room is large tonight, accommodating, besides the NCIS contingent of 9, the Captain and his 19 year old daughter Vicki, whom Tony had pegged before she sat down, slim and an inch taller than her father; Doctor Adam Bricker, Lieutenants Burl Smith and Isaac Washington and Cruise Director Julie McCoy.

The ship's Master exhibits the careful balance of authority and wisdom that characterizes the best of leaders. He has commanded several ships yet has stood on the bridge of this one for a lifetime; his daughter's lifetime. It's said he got his first Command at the same time he started losing his hair, but few beside Adam Bricker would dare say it to his increasing face.

x

Julie had initially avoided Abby's eyes, rather difficult when they'd wound up seated opposite one another. She'd approached the NCIS Scientist this afternoon with the delicate matter of her sister's expression of her romantic fulfillments and had been set straight about relationships. She'd passed that information along to her partners.

But Abby, after the fourth time of Julie's averting her eyes in lingering embarrassment, turns right to the head of the table. "Captain Stubing, I have to apologize to your command crew."

"Whatever for?"

"When we came aboard, Ziva and I were teasing Special Agent Gibbs, and we gave your crew the impression that we were his daughters, as if this..." she catches Gibbs' look, " _distinguished_ gentleman were old enough to be our father. We apologize; we're not related."

"We are the most unrelated people there are," Ziva seconds.

"I'll drink to that," Tony says.

"No need to apologize," Adam Bricker assures her. "Certainly no harm done."

"Thank you."

x

Merrill Stubing is not only interested in this large and diverse group but anxious to hear stories about his old and long separated friend Jennifer Shepherd. Stubing turns to the man on his left. "So, Special Agent Gibbs–"

"Jethro," he invites, not anxious to have their status known and very much not on duty.

"Jethro. How is my old friend Jen?"

"Good."

"How do you know Jenny?" Tony asks before catching a glance from the boss. "Director Shepherd."

"We lived a few doors away from one another," Stubing says. "In Pasadena." He glances to his daughter on his right. "Way back before I met your mother." He smoothes his pate. "I even had hair then."

"You were a Flower Child," Bricker reminds him.

Vicki doesn't manage to suppress her chortle, just to cut it off too late. "I'm sorry, dad. I'm really having trouble picturing you in a tye dyed Dashiki, Love Beads and hair down to your epaulets."

"Well, it was a very different time, and I wasn't the only one."

"Do tell," Tony urges.

"DiNozzo."

"You two ever date?" Vicki asks with a devastating smile, not knowing that she'd saved the agent's hairstyle.

Stubing looks to his guests like he's sorry he ever brought up the connection. "As I said, the years were very different."

"She's a very good director," Gibbs says, mostly to the daughter.

"Of a Government Agency," Stubing finishes, sounding quite pleased by the former 'girl next door'. "You know, you could've knocked me over with a feather when she called to see if we had accommodations available on this trip."

"I hope it did not inconvenience you," Ziva says.

"Oh, not at all. I'm just sorry I couldn't have you billeted together instead of being spread throughout the ship. My fault entirely. I'm deeply sorry I forgot to order it arranged."

"We see enough of each other," Gibbs assures him.

"I for one am happy to get some time by myself," Tony says.

"I'll remember that," Jeanne Benoit says in dire tones as she places her hand on the small clutch purse at her right, "a moment before you remember you asked me to hold both our keys."

x

The Captain's daughter watches closely everything that goes on at the table, even when projecting the impression that she is not. Brought aboard at a very young age through a remarkable set of events, she has literally grown up on this ship and among this crew and the hundreds of guests she meets every week. Girlhood naiveté has long since given way to womanly charm and poise, but these don't prevent her from reveling in the joy of meeting new friends, the most constant aspect of her life.

"So," Vicki Stubing says, "let's see if I've got this straight. At this table with us we have five Secret Agents–"

"Not Secret," McGee counters, "just not especially loud."

"Unless you count Abby's radio," Gibbs tells her, having been the most frequent victim of her auditory assaults.

"Bestselling Author."

"I hear you're aboard to work on your next Novel," Isaac ventures.

"Yes," Tim admits, flattered by the recognition and doing his best not to show it.

Tony drops his voice two octaves and throws in a hint of Sean Connery. "The Continuing Adventures from the Case Files of L. J. Tibbs."

"Can you tell us anything about it?" Gopher urges.

"Only the title, 'The Other Locked Room'."

"Taken literally from the Case Files."

"Tony."

"I bet I know how it ends," he announces. "Forensic Scientist Amy Sutton and Apprentice Forensic Pathologist Sabrina Shore move in together."

"Isn't she gay?" Gopher ventures. "But I thought Amy Sutton was straight."

"I haven't decided on Amy and Sabrina," Tim declares, more to his tormentor who at least hasn't revealed the plot of the mystery. "I think they should stay apart."

"Nonsense," Abby, half of said team, declares. "They're perfect for each other."

"Not really a good idea." If she knew what he had planned for the women, she'd probably kill him.

x

Sensing the increasing tension among the friends, Vicki resumes her original assessment. "Three Doctors counting Adam, a Scientist–"

"Mad Scientist," Tony quips.

"Never mad, Tony. I maintain my happiness level because I always get even."

"Ouch."

"I _love_ your tattoos," Vicki declares, envy heavy in her tone.

In the sleeveless and very low back black gown with faux gems that glitter in a triple row along the edge of her décolletage, the scientist is a virtual canvas though not everyone can read the messages in her art. She has an Infinity band on one forearm, R.I.P. on the other, smiley face on her left middle finger, a spider and its web on her neck, two Saint emblems on her shoulder blades and the entirety of the huge ornate cross on her back as the more prominent examples. In the black bikini she'd almost worn today several others of her sixteen had been visible while only the two intimate ones hadn't been.

"Thank you."

"I'd love to get a tattoo."

"When you're older," her father assures her.

"I'm nineteen," she says, her smile hinting that this is an old debate. "How old is old enough?"

"When you catch up to me."

x

Into the moment of light and familiar contest that always has a different though decisive dénouement, Gopher points out that "You left one off your list, Vicki," he says with a glance to the green gowned redhead. "Priest."

"Oh, sorry," she says to the neglected guest, who waves the apology off with a smile.

Smith turns to her. "How did you wind up as a Priest?"

"Gopher." Stubing is mortified but his guest doesn't seem to mind.

"Simple," she tells the Lieutenant with a kind smile. "Rabbinical School was full that year."

x

Over the chuckles three carts are wheeled up with fifteen dinners and their orders are served with due dispatch. When the Stewards have withdrawn but before anyone has raised a utensil Stubing pulls their attentions. "I wonder if I might ask-" Looking at the redhead, he realizes he doesn't know how to continue until he hears Gibbs' low whisper from his left, "Mother McGee if you would be so kind as to say Grace?"

"Of course." She sees movement start about the table. "No, please, stay seated." She doesn't want to draw extended attention.

"Father, we thank you for this day that has passed and the one you prepare for us. We thank you for friendships new and friendships renewed." She raises her right hand, index and middle fingers extended, thumb draped over ring and pinky fingers and slowly inscribes the Sign, taking in not only this table and the others but the food on the entire ship. "Now bless this food to our use, our lives to Thy continued service, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen."

Into the broken chorus of responses, before Stubing can offer his own thanks to his guest, there is a woman beside him.

x

" _Captain Stubing_!" the large, black haired woman in a voluminous royal blue gown addresses him from on high with the air of an outraged Fleet Admiral.

Stubing rises, wondering what problem could provoke this tone. He sees at the corner of his eye Julie McCoy rise as well. "Yes, Ma'am?"

Before she can give vent to the outrage darkening her face Julie says "Captain, this is Mrs. Dale Hannigan, of the Hannigan Players."

"Yes, we met earlier," he says. They'd been several interesting and unenviable encounters. He'd also heard from diverse crewmembers that the woman has thus far cut a swath through his ship, obliging her companion Mr. McCabe to make embarrassed apologies in her wake. Not all of them had been accepted by the other passengers. "What may I do for you?"

"I wish to register my dissatisfaction with this ship and its crew," she proclaims.

Guests don't often find something to be dissatisfied with, especially in such broad terms, less than half a day into the cruise but he's come to know this woman as an exceptional case. He calls upon many of his own thespic talents to inquire "What seems to be the problem?"

"The cabins assigned to us are completely inadequate."

"One sure is," Tim McGee mutters low enough that only his wife should hear him. He knows she did by the gentle elbow bump to his ribs.

"I'm sorry," Stubing says, the word tasting bad. It normally does not for a passenger. "It was my understanding that you had requested nine Singles."

"But not _those_ Singles." She glares at Julie, and then stabs the air with her finger under Stubing's nose, her wrist full of jangling bracelets. "That arrangement is completely unacceptable!"

He maintains eye contact rather than look cross-eyed at the digit. If anyone but a guest did this, the offending hand would not be slapped away, merely met with a frigid 'kindly remove your hand', leaving up to the offender the method in which that removal would take place.

He reminds himself, as he had on previous occasions, that this is a guest here to perform a specific service. He has his doubts that said service will ever be repeated after this cruise.

"What's wrong with them?"

x

There is little distinction among cabins having the same numbers of occupants. With the exception of views out of portholes and the closeness or distance to or from particular amenities, the cabins are virtually indistinguishable. Further, as he'd noted in the billeting list when he'd consulted it earlier, those nine cabins are close to the bow, which on airlines might constitute First Class. It's a symbolic courtesy, but a courtesy nonetheless.

Hannigan doubles her glare at Julie. " _She_ knows."

"Captain, I'll look into–"

"I expect the matter fully resolved before dinner is completed. And another thing," she says with her jangling wrist and the wagging finger Stubing wants to bite off, "your food selection is atrocious!"

"What's wrong with the food?"

"I distinctly ordered pheasant and your waiter had the _gall_ to tell me you do not _have_ any."

"Well, yes, that's true. We do not serve pheasant." His expression is professional polite, but those at the table expect he's thinking about adding something truly unpleasant to the menu.

"Why _not_?"

"Captain," Burl Smith says, coming around the table and up on his left side, "perhaps I should accompany Mrs. Hannigan and attempt to resolve this." He'd rather that Isaac give him a root canal with a set of serving spoons, but when the Captain is in danger the crew comes to his rescue; and after these people are gone, Stubing will still be here.

"I wish you would," he says.

"This way, Madam."

"I am _NOT_ a Madam!"

Smith does manage to lure her away without an 'oh, boy' roll of his eyes. But as she maneuvers to lead him he whispers to those at the table: "Henry the Fifth, Act 3, Scene 1."

Julie must clamp her hand quickly over her lips to block the giggle. He'd taken an interest in a Literary Teacher a few weeks ago. _That_ had been a very interesting cruise.

Those others who recognize the reference sympathize with the man.

"Miss McCoy," Stubing says when the pair is out of earshot, "would you accompany me please?"

"Yes, sir."

"Excuse us, ladies and gentlemen. We'll be right back."

x

A few yards to the side are far enough for their conversation to remain private and Julie relates the morning's incident and her decision not to put Meredith Tate the entire ship distant from her fellows and the shuffle of assignments it had required.

Stubing, knowing well the experience and efficiency of his crew, is not inclined to second guess their professional decisions. "We're full, I believe."

"Yes, sir."

"Well, normally I would attempt to resolve cabin issues by moving someone who had an objection into an empty cabin, but I'm not inclined to inconvenience Mr. Cummings by asking him to move a half day into our journey any more than I am to ask Ms. Tate to move unless she comes to me with dissatisfaction about her placement." He looks to the other side of the room and his beleaguered Purser. "Which wouldn't surprise me in the least."

There's a lot of flapping of arms going on over there, but he doubts the rotund woman will be able to achieve liftoff - though perhaps not for lack of trying. "However, if this is a matter of personalities I'm afraid they'll have to resolve it between themselves. As to the pheasant issue..." 'Pheasant.' "I wish Gopher luck."

"I'm sure he'll do fine, sir."

"If he doesn't jump overboard."

xx

"I'm sorry about that, ladies and gentlemen," Stubing says as he and McCoy resume their seats. "The life of a Captain."

"Cabins and pheasants," Vicki quips.

"Under glass, no doubt."

"What was that all about, Merrill?" Bricker asks, though he wishes the man hadn't. He supposes his friend has thus far been spared one of the woman's diatribes. That streak of luck won't last. He wonders if he'll hear about the woman's impassioned input on a medical procedure.

"A small conflict, that's all."

"Captain," McGee says, "I'm sorry; I wasn't going to bring this up but I feel I should."

"Honey, please don't," Siobhan pleads.

"What is it?"

"Another cabin issue."

"Honeeyyyy."

"No, I want to hear." Stubing really doesn't want to hear more about cabins before his first bite of his cooling food, but this is part of his job and the man is considerably more polite about it than Hannigan had been. "What's wrong with your cabin?"

"Not ours," Siobhan counters, conceding that to stop her husband is impossible. She doesn't want to recall that it had been she who had made up her mind to bring up the matter.

"This afternoon Shav and I visited Meredith Tate, one of the actresses in tomorrow's play."

He explains the conditions the young woman must endure. "The reason I bring it up is that I'm concerned it would be a fire hazard." That had been the content of his wife's objection, and though she'd changed her mind about raising it he feels it's potentially serious enough to warrant action.

"It most certainly is, to say nothing of an unfair inconvenience that reflects badly upon the Cruise Line. Those trunks should have been taken directly to the Hold."

"As I understand it," Tim says, "your men did try, but Mrs. Hannigan strenuously objected. She insisted they be kept safe and within reach for when they're needed for the performances. "

"Yes, I've become quite acquainted with Mrs. Hannigan's strenuous objections."

x

He'd received the first of them shortly after the Pacific Princess had cast off, something about the number of standing bars on the ship in addition to the Pirate's Cove. He's known guests who could not tell him at the end of their trips how many freestanding bars the ship had, let alone have an objection regarding them before the towers of LA were out of sight.

Her companion, a Mr. McCabe, had lingered to offer profuse and very embarrassed apologies to both him and the guests with whom he'd been conversing with when the woman had interjected herself.

The second was two hours out, over Princess Cruise Line's designation of the Pacific as a 'Luxury' vessel when it contained 'only seven decks', quite ignoring the others that guests do not see. Mr. McCabe had tried to defuse that encounter as well, the man's success on that occasion had been a result his many years as Captain of this and other vessels and dealing with the idiosyncrasies of a wide range of guests. However, by that point Hannigan had placed herself in contention to set records.

The third - which he was not inclined to listen too closely to - was a single encounter about two hours before dinner over the placement of tables in the Riviera Lounge and the fourth was the pheasant debacle. They have now been under way for close to ten hours, with some five days to go.

"At any rate the trunks, if she sets such store in their safety, should be evenly dispersed among the nine cabins. How much of Ms. Tate's space is taken up?"

"Well, if she turns sideways she can squeeze from the bed to the Head, but her closets are inaccessible."

Two Meredith Tate issues in as many minutes. "After dinner, I shall pay Ms. Tate a visit."

x

Fortunately he's able to begin his dinner and a few minutes later, in the midst of their conversation, Gopher returns to his own chair, considerably worse for wear.

"Well, I resolved the pheasant problem. That's the good news."

'Oh Lord.' "What's the bad news?"

"Tomorrow after the play, someone's going to have to come up with oysters Rockefeller."

"Wonderful. You're elected to cook it."

Gopher looks to Julie. "Or close the wall up with our English dead."


	6. Ground Zero

Chapter Six  
Ground Zero

On Saturday afternoon following a morning of doing absolutely nothing of consequence, though the mixed shuffleboard tournament - men against women - was fun and he doesn't mind one bit having to grant his prize for losing, Tim is alone in Promenade 238. Shav, together with the other women, is off celebrating their victory and doing whatever it is women do when their husbands and so forth aren't around.

They'd won completely unfairly, of course, being (allegedly) clothed in the bikinis they'd bought yesterday and imparting every movement with sensuality rarely seen off a burlesque stage. Furthermore they'd had an additional unfair advantage in the lopsided teams, five versus four, but he doesn't remember hearing a single objection to the unbalanced contest.

Now he sits deep in a sinfully comfortable chair and lets the gentle sway of the ship lull him while he works on his electronic Writing Pad, very content with the fact that he has absolutely nothing to do for the rest of the afternoon but work on 'The Other Locked Room', his fourth novel and to wonder what new sensuality charged swindle is growing in Abby's too fertile imagination.

He hopes her next scheme is sufficiently devious. This one won't cost him anything to pay off other than exhaustion, but later when he and Shav wake up he'll ask if they've sufficiently evened the score or if he has more debt to pay off.

He hopes he will.

x

The women had set the terms for their potential winnings, while the men had deferred, suspecting there would be little point in selecting their prizes in advance of the 5 - 4 contest. When the women had won, an inevitable result, they'd taken off for the rest of the morning, firmly demonstrating the adage 'absence makes the heart grow fonder'. But he knows that Shav, Michelle and Jeanne will have absolutely no difficulty in collecting their winnings later.

What Abby and Ziva will do he truly doesn't want to know.

This was definitely an example of a contest in which there are no losers - other than Gibbs, of course. He'd amended the prize in the contest to be money, very definitely a wise and discreet decision, for in the inevitable loss he only had Abby and Ziva with whom he could settle the prize pot.

x

When the women had departed to concoct their next devious plan, he'd taken a leisurely exploratory walk of the ship and the many feminine attractions available to the avid sightseer, the limit of his participation in the hunt, but Shav had still been gone when he'd come back. She's undoubtedly still walking with the other women on the decks. They're doing a lot of walking alone but he's not at all concerned. He'll have plenty of time for long romantic walks with his lovely wife later - though then he'll have to curtail the sightseeing.

x

He's very much into 'The Other Locked Room', especially after the inspiration Shav had given him for this particular section. Being a secret Muse for Meredith Tate seems to have awakened his own. The fashions he's been exposed to here - and he uses the word 'exposed' very liberally - have inspired him.

Lyndi Crawshaw has employed the adage 'Sex Sells' often, though he's always resisted, feeling that his work - carefully crafted Mysteries - doesn't need the crutch.

However, inspired by a boatload of sexy women, he's deep into a scene where the character Sabrina Shore, pert and perky blonde lesbian Forensic Pathologist Apprentice of Dr. Richard Dodgers and a deep devotee of the S&M lifestyle, has seduced straight but experimentitive Forensic Specialist Amy Sutton.

She has the surprised woman bound on the floor of her own lab, her clothes scattered to the four corners while Sabrina uses a-

x

The door unlocks from the outside and he looks up to see Shav step in. He quickly saves the file and turns off the device; what he's been writing is not for virginal eyes and most especially not for Shav's.

The first thing he notices, after the green bikini and what it would pretend to hide - itself a lightning strike to his inspiration and his libido - is that her spirits were probably a lot higher before she'd gone for a celebratory walk on the deck with the four other women, for they are definitely not high now.

"What's wrong?"

She turns from locking the door. "Huh? Oh, honey, I didn't see you there."

She's locking the door, not knowing he's inside? Very unusual. "Then I repeat: 'what's wrong'?"

She picks up the green robe that she'd left behind on the dresser beside the door, pulls it on and unfortunately hides the bikini and the treasures it teases about, but she cinches the waistband hard, yanks it probably uncomfortably tight. It looks uncomfortable, but that only tells him the sharp pull was more important than comfort. "I don't want to bother you with it."

x

Four months of married life have taught Tim much about women in general and especially about his beautiful wife. He's always been a quick study and on this subject he's particularly motivated. When she's giving no consideration to her words, as now, she's habitual and he, like a good husband, has learned those subconscious habits.

Since most of her life revolves around the Church and her flock - and her extended flock at 'Enkiss' - she's fallen into three kinds of automatic responses on matters such as this which he's learned to take note of when he hears them. It's not like she speaks thoughtlessly, far from it, but when she uses distinct phrases there's a wealth of meaning behind them which, at such times, he suspects she doesn't even realize she's giving him.

'I can't talk about it' means exactly that and he backs off. 'I don't want to talk about it' means 'it' is bothering her but she does want to have it drawn out of her. 'I don't want to bother you with it' means 'it' is _really_ bothering her and she's dying to unburden herself if he'll listen to her.

He's long ago learned that the only wise response, especially if he wants a pleasant balance of the evening, is to put aside whatever he's doing and give the problem his full attention. "What is it?"

"There are times I wish I were a Secretary so I could punch a clock."

x

He doesn't need a translation of that. Many times he's heard her observe that 'you can take the woman out of the Church, but you can't take the Church out of the woman'. These too come in several flavors, 'determined' if she is going to do something and is about to hit him with it and 'dejected' when the burdens of the life start to become overwhelming.

He recognizes that this time her wish is not for a set schedule she can walk away from at the end of the day, but for the opportunity to punch something.

From her expression, and the way she sits down on the double bed, this definitely is a crossover to the dejected phase.

"Tell me."

"I was out on deck with Abby, Ziva, Jeanne and Michelle and having a pretty nice time; girl talk, you know?" He nods, not about to point out that girl talk too frequently sounds like Venutian, or at least it does to a Martian such as himself. "Suddenly I'm in the middle of an increasingly emotional discussion about getting married."

"What, Tony and Jeanne are getting married?" He hadn't seen it coming other than as a _maybe_ possible future, but he considers this a reasonable conclusion. After all, Michelle's already married and so far as he knows Abby and Ziva aren't even seeing anyone.

" _No_. That I could tolerate."

Uh oh. Shav is not an absolutist, but when she uses the 'T' word it means things, whatever they were, did not go well and he should proceed with caution.

"What happened?"

x

"We were up on deck, looking not a bit like ourselves," considering their tournament when Tony, on a well timed slip of Abby's top, had nearly launched the shuffleboard puck into the Pacific, he considers this a marvelous understatement, "when this couple came up to us. They'd been searching all morning for 'Mother McGee'. The bartender, Isaac, pointed me out and they came over.

"Well, I had to excuse myself from the others - something I was loath to do, I assure you - but when someone comes to me looking for a Priest nine out of ten times it's like from one of your 'Eyes Only' files, you know?" He does indeed.

"Turns out that before flying out here they were scammed out of their wedding. This was supposed to be a Honeymoon Cruise for them."

"That's too bad," he says for something to say, because he can read in her pause that something has gotten her really mad and she hasn't gotten to it yet, but that when she does he'd better be agreeing or ducking.

She looks down at the robe, loosens it from the uncomfortable cinch, then sighs and takes it off. His attention level, spiked at this moment, rockets up over Everest when she grabs the green material at each side and pulls the green bikini top up over her head.

"They'd gotten together with a man who was pretending to be a Priest!"

x

His eyes are riveted on her body. He can't help himself, never could. Her breasts are so full and firm and smooth don't even need a bra but for her profession she dare not dispense with one, yet the only word that can force its way into his wordsmith's head is spectacular. So smooth, so supple, so touchable and he so wants to. Her nipples, pink nubs atop pink areolas make him long to get them between his lips and make her forget her anger.

"Outrageous," he says seconds too late but she's so upset she hasn't noticed the delay. He knows she's outraged over the deception he's had to replay in his mind before he can absorb it, and he's thoroughly determined to be known to be on her side on this issue. He's also very careful this time to react openly to only what she's saying rather than what she's just done, tremendously difficult though that is. He still can't pull his eyes from her breasts and the many memories they spark.

On any other occasion pulling off her top like that would bring him out of the deep chair, but this time she's as likely to respond with fists as with lips.

Truth be known, he's offended too, though to less a degree than her outrage. She takes things like this very seriously.

He's distracted from the outrage again when she pushes the emerald bottom down her legs and steps out of it.

x

He'd only thought it was hard to concentrate before, and he keeps his writing computer and hands upon his lap for concentration on their conversation is no longer the only thing that's gotten hard.

He remembers the night he'd convinced her how sensitive she'd feel, how sensual touch would feel if she got rid of the hair that blocked both their fun. Since then it'd stayed their sensual secret, the fact that even in the most serious of public occasions they knew she was ready for him.

But even in this he dares not break his concentration, despite the pleasure of sight and thoughts, for she is so utterly not in a romantic - or carnal - mood.

He also recognizes, with that ever decreasing area of his mind that can think non-carnal thoughts, that this matter with the fake priest and his scam, offensive and outrageous as it is to hear, is not the center of her ire. Oh, she's mad about the fraud, but that's a fireplace blaze compared to the conflagration he can feel is about to erupt.

He watches intently as she goes to her underwear drawer and pulls out panties and bra, nicely attractive ones, then pulls from another drawer blue shorts and a red tee shirt.

Though he'd watched intently, committing this moment to memories beside ones of equivalent delight, he hadn't introduced one sexual word into the conversation, mostly for self preservation. There was absolutely nothing sexual in her manner and he's pretty sure she's so consumed that the thought had never entered her mind.

He's always had an eye for beauty, in particular the beauty that is his wife, so he's well affected by the brief show but, focused as she was, she had no idea any effect applied.

She steps into the lacy panties and he tries to keep a mounting regret from showing, particularly when he catches a final glimpse of her labia, then must bid farewell to her delightful breasts as she covers them with, pleasantly enough for his hopes for later, a very sheer pink demi-bra.

At least his many surprise gifts from Victoria's Secret hadn't been forgotten on this trip, and there will be opportunities later when she's in a better mood. But for now he must endure the pain as she steps into the blue shorts and pulls the red tee shirt on, pulling her red hair out and spreading it behind her.

If he weren't so sure about later - she still has her winnings to collect on that bet - the last few moments of ignited and brutally crushed libido would have been too painful for words.

She takes from beside the dresser the double large clear draw string tie laundry bag already partially filled with yesterdays clothes and what they'd worn to breakfast before Abby came to them with her scheme and shoves the bikini into it. She looks like she wants to throw the bag back into it's place but she stops, takes a deep breath and sets it back.

x

But Tim has to push that intense display from his mind. He has to. His wife needs him.

Over months of intense observation, and especially since their wedding, he's engaged in a crash course for Post Graduate Credit toward a PhD in Husbandry - and sometimes he feels like a plant - so he's thoroughly learned to read his wife. In her expressions, her mannerisms, her phraseology, her eyes and most especially her voice, she's a book he strives to always keep open. Her voice is his most useful guide, for by it he can read her even when unable to see her.

Her brogue covers a vast range of feelings, from mellow to loving - when it's like music in his ears - to sharp when she's annoyed, cutting when she's angry, able to draw blood at ten paces when she's furious as she is right now.

He has to pay strict attention to every syllable for she's virtually unintelligible, and that means she's left conflagration far behind and is rapidly building to a nuclear blast.

"The man in Missouri who pretended to be a priest got arrested - Thank _God_ \- but it left them in the lurch."

"Quite a mess," he admits, expecting this is the moment to duck when she turns full on him.

" _That was when James Palmer told them that_ I _would marry them_!"

x

All right, he'd survived the blast with little more than slight charring of his shirt, now for the assessment. He's as outraged for her - what was Palmer thinking? - but she's not done venting.

"But this isn't Missouri!" She virtually breathes the fire. "It's barely still California."

"And you're licensed in DC, Maryland, Virginia and New York."

As a Priest, her authority to perform weddings comes from the Diocese in which she's assigned but Priests also serve as agents of the government. There are documents to be filed to make the marriage legal to civil authorities, and to do that a priest must be licensed with the particular State. He suspects that's what tripped up the other person.

"Right!" She looks about the cabin. "Hon, can we get out of here? I have to take a walk or I'll explode."

"Don't want that," he says, pushes out of the chair and reaches for his sneakers as she does for her sandals. Maybe he'd misread the detonation. Maybe it's still to come. All he does know for certain is that at this moment, if she does explode, he's the only one standing at Ground Zero.

xxx

Abby, Jeanne, Michelle and Ziva continue their casual stroll along the decks, casual in terms of pace but hardly so in intent for two of them.

While Michelle is married and Jeanne is in a committed relationship that there'd be no straying from with Tony never more than a few hundred feet distant, Abby and Ziva are footloose, fancy free and very much on the prowl.

While their conversation doesn't reflect this, for to do so would be grossly unfair to the others, they do devote considerable attention to trolling.

Each of them has already found one companion to keep the cruise from getting boring. In fact, Abby had heard about Ziva's conquest. As she'd gotten it from the supremely embarrassed Cruise Director, the whole of their deck's quarter could have heard.

x

It's impossible for four minimally bikinied women, even considering the eye candy competition, to stroll the decks without attracting attention. They represent among them a wide range of male interest, even though they have no blonde in their midst and the redhead had been pulled away.

Michelle had let fall, in a loose moment of female bonding, that the leopard skin bikini she wears, smaller even than yesterday's scarlet one, closely resembles Jimmy's favorite bra and panty set. She'd said that to him they represent the inspiration for some 'Sheena' fantasy - at least it had last night - while it's also like she's walking about in public in her underwear. With this double barrel inspiration, Abby feels it's a wonder he hasn't carried her away to their jungle hut by now.

 _ **Sweeeeeeet - sweeeeeewwwwww**_.

x

All right, they've individually and collectively sparked plenty of attention on this stroll, seen so many eyes go down and up - and down them that they feel like topographical maps, but this is the first time someone has been so boorish as to shrill a wolf whistle behind them. They ignore it, tacitly agree by their glances that such a lout isn't entitled to a look back so they know who to avoid later, but they can't ignore the second whistle. The rude oaf actually manages to make it sound more sensual than the first. But when they do turn: " _TONYYYY_."

This outfit had to come from the ship's store, because blue fishing hat, green sunglasses, yellow tee shirt, tan shorts and red flip-flops would have earned him five head slaps on land. "Hello, ladies."

Hands on shapely hips, Abby admonishes the Technicolor montage who has truly recalibrated overindulgence that "Ladies do not respond to wolf whistles, other than to give slaps."

"Oh, don't worry, he'll get one," Jeanne promises.

"He might like it too much," Michelle cautions "He's always thanking Special Agent Gibbs for his."

"Those are just signs he likes me."

"Gibbs doesn't slap where _I'll_ slap him," Jeanne promises, feeling she should shield her eyes.

"I do not know for certain about that," Ziva observes with a look to Bermuda bikinied Abby. "He does spend a great deal of time in the Forensics Lab, and he always returns in a much better mood than when he'd left."

"I'll never tell," Abby swears, rubbing a phantom pain from her derrière, "but I've been working for a long time on putting Gibbs in some good moods."

" _Oooooooooo_." the three friends agree.

"I think I shouldn't be hearing this," Tony says, made quite uncomfortable by that speculative chorus.

"Don't worry, Agent DiNozzo," Michelle advises. "None of us will be putting you in that good a mood."

"Speak for yourself," Jeanne admonishes as she steps over and puts her arms about Tony's left. "In fact, I'm calling in your 'on demand' debt. Even though you look like you lost another bet, you have to pay up now for losing ours."

"What do you have in mind, Doctor?"

"I'm in the market for a mood enhancing treatment."

"That's what this is for," he counters, spreading his arms.

"I said 'mood enhancement', not hilarity."

"Then what did you have in mind?"

"A protein injection." She looks significantly toward his hypo. "You can give it to me during my internal."

With only a glance to the others she guides him off. Abby, Michelle and Ziva can see from the cant of his head that the examination has already begun.

x

"Our little group is growing smaller," Abby observes.

"It's about to get even smaller," Michelle announces and walks faster than her friends, arms out to greet her most special friend. When she reaches him, from all indications he's very happy to get together with her and she won't have a bit of trouble collecting her winnings either.

It's a real pity, however, that Gibbs had played for money, though only five dollars between them, for he had gone in knowing it was a contest he could only lose.

When she'd proposed the terms she'd really hoped, against all reason and reality, that she could get Gibbs to join in. But now, since neither of them would ever consider poaching, she and Ziva are odd winners out.

As they continue walking into a broad section of deck, "Looks like it's just you and me."

"I am not too sure about that, Abby." She is staring somewhat to her left, causing the scientist to follow her direction.

"Uh oh, flock of chicken hawks at 1015." Maybe they won't be losing winners after all.

Their open stares from thirty feet away eventually get noticed, and there's no offense at the invasion of personal space.

"Looks like we have been made," Ziva warns.

"Not yet, but give me about fifteen minutes."

"That one on the right. Which of you, do you think, has the greater number of tattoos?"

"I intend to find out," she declares, setting an attack course and engaging with all weapons hot and ready.


	7. The Axe Falls

Chapter Seven  
The Axe Falls

Michelle strolls slowly along the smallest and uppermost deck with her husband and feels his eyes pet her body through the very small leopard skin bikini she wears.

It's a very good match to his favorite pair of her underwear and last night, when she'd modeled it for him, it had prompted a 'Sheena, Queen of the Jungle' fantasy in which she'd been a captive while her abductor carried her through the jungle to his lair and very thoroughly had his way with her.

Of course, it's the duty of any captive to try to escape, so while he was distracted after getting her top off by his ministrations to what was so enticingly revealed, she'd broken free and had almost escaped - she couldn't leave the cabin - but she'd been captured again, dragged back to the lair, pulled over his lap and had been taught a thorough and painful lesson on the evils of trying to run from what she so richly deserved.

In fact, after being stripped of all her protection, she'd collected on that richness for so long that it'd been very difficult to get up this morning. To put these skins on again to participate in a very unfair contest, then to go for a walk with her friends in the jungle only she could see had been an act of supreme courage.

He'd been good when Abby had suggested a shuffle board contest, though the prizes the victors would get guaranteed favorable outcomes no matter which team had won. Only Gibbs was a holdout, saying he preferred to pay his losses or take his winnings in cash, though this time she could see his reasons all too well. Women versus men, no matter how he fared, the result with either Abby or Ziva - both together? - would have been cosmic in its awkwardness.

x

But though Jimmy had, of course, kept their secret about that jungle encounter, - though she certainly couldn't - she knew if she remained out of the lair after the contest she might encounter her captor again and fall back into his nefarious clutches. Perhaps she'd even be punished for her escape this morning.

And if he doesn't come upon her ready to resume this red hot jungle dream, she has plenty of ways of inspiring him. But she's not certain she wants to do so; she's not entirely confident, following a very thorough lesson, that last night's redness has completely faded.

But it's not her abductor she encountered on deck after her walkabout, it's her husband. But she knows him so well she knows that this time he's particularly interested in her walking about in public wearing only her 'bra and panties'.

They stop at the rail which comes up to her chest so she can rest on her crossed arms while he leans over it. They watch the water far below passing like a raging river and she's not entirely sure she isn't going to wind up again in that jungle lair before the dinner show.

At any rate, seeing and feeling his gaze petting her, and noting the condition of his shorts, she knows she's going to wind up somewhere before long and wonders if it would've been a good idea to have borrowed one of Sammy Sky's ball gags.

xx

Tim, his arm about Siobhan as they walk along the Sun deck - she'd given him sincere apologies for the unfairness of what she'd done to him earlier and promised to make it up to him after lunch - notices several yards ahead Michelle Palmer, and beyond her Jimmy, leaning upon the Starboard rail looking out to the distant horizon. They're twenty yards away and he, he hopes with sufficient subtlety, veers her left and inboard. He needn't have bothered, for no sooner does he shift their course than she slams to a halt. His arm about her, he feels her muscles tighten. "Shaaaaav..."

"Timmy, can you keep hold of Michelle?" Anger again flames her voice.

"Huh?" He'd been congratulating himself on cooling her rage with inconsequentialities and the ocean view from the highest deck. Now he knows all those efforts are wasted. Shav doesn't normally stay angry for any length of time but when something gets at her, such as now, she can be very Irish.

"I want to talk to him _alone_." Yes, her anger is stoking back up into a searing flame. "Can you _do_ that?"

"Uh, I guess so. But is this the best time?"

He prays she's listening, but a look into her emerald eyes tells him he's wasted this breath too. Her normal style of conflict resolution is a quiet talk in a closed room but "James Palmer has tried my patience far too much and one time too often. Keep Michelle away from us."

That she makes it an order is surprising enough. She leaves him behind and strides up to and around the oblivious couple.

x

"You know, honey," Jimmy says, bent over the rail with his right arm draped around the waist of his leopard skin bikinied wife, he enjoying her bare skin and the views both distant and very near, feels the warm breezes and the gentle sway of the huge ship lulling him into a very relaxed mood, "I think this trip is the best thing that could happen to u-"

" _James_!"

The word makes them both jump in their skins. It's not loud but it is very intense and he looks left. Mother McGee stands beside him as though she'd popped in on the spot. The breeze blowing in from behind makes her red hair resemble a fiery mane blazing above her red tee shirt. "Oh, hi, Moth-."

"James, I want to talk to you."

It's hard, glancing right to his wife, to tell which of them is more surprised by her firm voice and the fury - _Fury_? From Mother _McGee_? - that burns in her eyes. He turns back, wondering what could provoke this reaction.

"Is anything-?"

She whirls away, stalks off, looks back over her shoulder. "Come with me!" she commands as she walks fast.

Jimmy looks down to his wife but is further surprised to find Tim at her right side.

"You'd better go."

Michelle is equally surprised at his materialization and they look from him leftward to see Siobhan forty feet away within a curved overlook whose rail extends over the deck below.

Jimmy turns back to Tim but all the agent says is "Now."

x

Jimmy looks down to Michelle, seeing she's as mystified as she is. He steps away from her to follow the Priest, unable to imagine what could provoke the incandescent fury in her eyes.

Michelle is equally surprised at the Priest's act but can only turn to her partner. "Tim, what's going on?"

"Big trouble."

"What?" She half turns to where Jimmy approaches the woman and takes a step to follow.

"Stay here."

She turns back, even more surprised. That was a Command. Tim McGee suggests or influences or occasionally directs when the situation warrants it but he does not Command her. "Why?"

"Because some things shouldn't be heard."

x

As Jimmy approaches Mother McGee in the curved railed outcropping which forms a private overlook to the deck below he slows, mounting apprehension halting him. In her red tee shirt and blue shorts, her fiery hair windblown from behind, she looks more suited to one of the characters from a movie about 'Chelle's Coven. "Yes?"

"Come in here." Her voice seethes

He obeys, incredulous. He has only seen this woman mad on one occasion, this against Dennis Whitney when they'd thought he was Tim McGee and he'd attacked her, but she's clearly gone light years beyond that rage. He wonders if his first exposure to her Irish fury is destined to be his last.

She steps around him to block his path out and to keep others away. It at least allows her red hair to blow back now, but as an element in a supernatural movie it's not much of an improvement. He still feels doomed, and more apprehensive because he can't find the reason for his demise.

Four days ago he and 'Chelle had gone to her for a very fruitful resolution to their ongoing problems. It's clear this conversation is not going to be as beneficial.

Astonishment building upon astonishment, he receives one more when she says, her face red as her tee shirt, her emerald eyes blazing and her brogue razor sharp, "James Palmer, I am so angry with you that I do not even know the words to express it."

x

"What's wrong?"

She looks up to the cloudless sky. "'What's wrong' he says." Again she fixes her eyes on his and he'd rather she not. "You have placed me in a perfectly horrible position, thank you very much. If not for the fact that I am a Priest and you are an idiot I've half a mind to throw you off this balcony."

He backs a step deeper into the half circle despite knowing it's a mistake. He can't imagine violence from her toward him - they're friends and Mother McGee is the calmest person he knows, bar none - but that blazing insult had been completely unlike her or anything he'd ever imagined from her.

He's grown half used to dealing with 'Chelle's rages, but has no idea how to deal with Mother McGee's. What _is_ it about his life that inspires such anger in women? "What did I do?"

"Mary Clark and Joseph Wagner came to see me earlier."

"Who?"

Again she casts appeal to the sky, or at least to Someone he can't see but he has the uncomfortable feeling he's about to meet. "'Who?' he asks. Father, grant me your strength to resist my own strength so I do not _throttle_ him." She lowers her eyes to him and again he wishes she wouldn't. Her tone takes on a very challenged patience, as though one more wrong word will be his last.

It makes her more frightening.

"Mary Clark is the woman who she and her boyfriend wanted to marry, says she. The one you volunteered _me_ to wed with not so much as a 'by your leave'."

"Oh." He can see himself sailing over the rail, followed by a funeral at sea - which she can conduct.

"So they came to me out of the clear blue sky," she waves her hand upward, "with your offer, even though this was a day after you offered it on my behalf. Thank you kindly for the heads up."

"Is it a problem?"

x

Again she appeals to that higher power. "Father, if he asks me one more stupid question I swear he will become his own patient." She looks down again and he'd only thought she was angry before. " _Yes_ there is a problem. There are a great _many_ problems and I would have been happy to list them for you in detail had you come to me before offering my services."

He's had enough. "I did not 'offer your services'. I told her you married 'Chelle and I and suggested they _talk_ to you, not that there was any deal."

"And do you happen to remember how much work had to go into _that_ wedding? Allow me to remind you that you are a Roman who has married an Episcopalian _Witch_ , and while I was finally able to persuade Bishop Metcalf that it was a valid and loving relationship and eventually receive his very grudging permission by telling him she might one day be persuaded to renounce that foolishness, I never _did_ persuade your Parish priest.

"You wed even before the Pre-Cana Counseling sessions and I wish I'd conveyed the fallout _I_ paid for in that!

"You and she decided to go through with the ceremony because you never did care about your Church's stand and might well have Converted, or she would, but there are some in the Roman hierarchy who do not consider yours to be a valid marriage. I seriously _doubt_ that you forgot all our conversations and preparations on that issue."

He can say little - the discovery that she'd been penalized for his impulsiveness stings - but has to admit "No, I haven't."

"And when you spoke to Mary Clark did you even find out what denomination she and her fiancé follow?"

"No," he admits half as loudly. "I said she should talk to you."

"Well, they thought it from your conversation yesterday from an inquiry into today as a done deal, and were devastated when I had to refuse."

x

"You refused?" He hadn't seen that coming. The woman had been so forlorn, and it'd seemed such a simple, reasonable and easy solution. They were here, she was here, a God send.

"James, of _course_ I refused. I _had_ to."

"Why?"

She looks like this was his 'last stupid word' but she visibly fights the emotion down, takes a deep breath and says with frightening calm - her screaming at him would be less unnerving -

"One, I _can't_ legally wed Romans. Two, I am not licensed in Missouri or in California, so out here I can't legally wed _anyone_. Three, we are not even _in_ California, we're at sea somewhere off the California/Mexico coast. Four, I cannot sanction their living together as man and wife regardless of their arrangements or how they were treated by that bastard fraud in Missouri. I had to advise them to arrange separate cabins." She takes a step forward, crowds him against the rail, her eyes harden and again he fears for his neck. "And _Five_ , do not _ever_ presume to speak for me again, or even give the impression that you are speaking for me. If you have an issue you think should be brought to my attention, fine. You bring it to me and _I_ shall speak to the people involved. Is that _Clear_?"

"Yes, ma'am," he whispers, too shamed to speak aloud.

"Okay." She breathes deeply, tries to exhale the anger. "Then enjoy the rest of your cruise."

She turns, stalks away and doesn't even slow or meet their eyes as she passes Tim and Michelle.

x

"Tim, what's going on?" Michelle demands again, seeing Jimmy looking very contrite and even more forlorn than when they'd fought on Tuesday in the Chaplain's office over his picture collection - and then the priest had been on their sides.

"Talk to him," he advises, turning to follow his wife. "I've got my hands full."

xx

By the time he catches up with Siobhan she's gone a deck down the companionway and all the way to the stern. She'd walked so quickly she'd gotten a minute ahead of him and he finds her leaning over the starboard rail, her hands clasped before her. "Shav?"

"It's okay." She pushes herself off the railing, uses her fingertips to dry her eyes.

"It had to be said."

"You didn't even hear it."

"I didn't have to. And Palmer's a man, he's able to take it like a man - or he'd better be."

She fingertip wipes her eyes again. He's never known her ever telling someone off, but then he never would know. "Whereas I'm just a weak, weepy woman."

"Weak? Never. Weepy? Not a chance. Woman? _Rrr-Rraawwrrrr_."

She laughs and for a moment it seems to make her feel better but she bends back over the rail and looks out over the waves. "Then why do I feel like I should run back and apologize for losing my temper?"

"You do and I'll give you a swatting they'll hear at the bow."

She turns her head to look up at him and this time she does smile. "We're too far from our cabin," she says, seeming confident that even though bent over the rail she's won this mini-round.

"Who said anything about a cabin?" He raises his hand but she doesn't straighten up.

"I know you'll never do it."

He looks to his left, to the couple too far out of range and ratchets his voice up to a Bugs Bunny level. "She don know me very well, do she?"

Her laugh does help dispel silent tears.

x

Siobhan won't tell him of his partner, the only one she knows in NCIS who purposefully provokes spankings from her husband, not because it's something learned in Reconciliation, just from Girl Talk. He's never shown an interest in Girl Talk, more a good thing she thinks. Like half the men she knows, his brain would probably crash and he'd need a manual reset.

She pushes up off the railing. "A sheare," she asks her love as 'ah hark', "could we take a walk?"

"Of course." He doesn't mention, quite wisely, that they'd already been taking a therapeutic walk. That was how this whole incident had begun. "But then I do want to get ready for dinner. Remember, it's first-come-first-serve."

"I know," she says. "I promised the girls to save seats. They'll all have their hands full getting those guys ready."

"You didn't tell anyone, did you?"

"Perish the thought. You said that you didn't want any credit."

"Absolutely not. It's all on Tate. If anyone learns I helped and it gets back to the Players this will be a waste."

"I know," she sighs, not wanting to think of the onus the young woman is under. "She had to do it all by herself."

"She did. After the first session I think her Writer's Block broke. She'd finished the rewrite last night. I just primed the pump, putting in what I knew of them."

"And you think you captured the real people?"

"As well as I could."

"So it's a satire," she teases.

He grins. "More like a caricature."

"A murder mystery with character assassination. Should be fun."


	8. The Duchess

Chapter Eight  
The Duchess

The Riviera Lounge is the largest of the dining halls, the split level space easily able to accommodate over a hundred people at half that many intimate tables and quite a few more at the larger circular tables. Tim and Siobhan meet Abby and Ziva on the main floor. "Where's Gibbs?" Tim asks.

"I have not found him," Ziva confesses.

"Neither did I," Abby grouses. Since Tony and Jimmy are simplicity to snag, the unattached women had been delegated to drag the taciturn senior into his seat, but when the man doesn't want to be found he usually is not.

Then again, he always knows where they are.

"We finally ran out of time," Abby concludes. "We couldn't snag him, so we had to come snag these seats."

The pair have commandeered four square tables and placed them together in a line out from the carpeted edge of the hardwood dance floor, allowing the end table to have an unused space so everyone will have an excellent view. Tim had let drop, through Siobhan before she'd gone on her excursion with the other women after the lopsided tournament, where the action would be centered so, with the advantage of inside knowledge, they'd arranged what they consider to be the best seats.

These four are on a direct line with a round table seating six and several square tables set in a line between, these each set for two. They're all on the hardwood dance floor, and the round table and one of the small square ones, this one slightly to the right of a line between the agents' and the round table, have 'RESERVED' placards set upon them.

'Theater in the Midst' rather than 'in the Round' places the performers within the audience rather than on an elevated stage, and is intended to give close access to the action and the feeling of being a participant rather than strictly an observer. But as far as Abby is concerned there's close and there's perfect and she'll settle for perfect as often as she can get it.

x

There are a few tables already occupied on the floor and the surrounding upper level, and it is to the round table that a party of six, two men and four women approach and one of the men places the 'Reserved' sign face down. The men sit at the twelve and six o'clock positions from the agent's vantage. Tim spots and very casually ignores Meredith Tate, clad in a very elegant and flattering white gown, her hair done in an upward coif, as she seats herself at the eight o'clock position.

When she glances about the room before picking up her menu, she doesn't look at him either.

At the row of tables he does tap his wife on her bare arm, uses only his eyes to guide in that direction. She glances, then winks at him before sweeping the skirt of her red dress as he holds her chair, this one at the base of the right from Gibbs' eventual position, then sits beside her.

x

The line of tables fills, Jimmy and Michelle taking seats nearest the 'head' of the table at the other side of the row, Jimmy in the corner to the column head's left, not too obviously keeping his eyes averted from Siobhan seated at the opposite end of the diagonal. She sees it's not from aversion that he doesn't look at her, but rather shame. Aversion would have hurt, but she doesn't want the man's shame either.

x

Michelle, on the other hand, does meet her eyes but to ask a question she thus far can't get an answer to. She'd tried with her previously maudlin husband, finally turned to ways of cheering him up. The result of that decision had been that she'd wound up again in last night's fantasy jungle lair, but his intensity this time left her breathless and stunned.

Their lovemaking is often intense, and she always a very active participant, but this was beyond anything she'd ever experienced from him. She was finally done, thoroughly satisfied and 'comed out' as she'd put it but he was insatiable, wild, nearly too much into the jungle fantasy that for her had become very real.

Thinking they were done, when she'd ridden him to glorious ecstacy and had moved to the post-coital cuddle stage, she'd been surprised at his sustained intensity and had been overcome when he'd pressed her, with surprising force, onto her back.

Sustained intensity from him wasn't new. She'd frequently - very frequently - used her Wiccan imparted talents to give him extra boosts in the past - several extra boosts when he would, like men often do, slag off until they were _both_ satisfied - but this time she hadn't even had the chance to try.

For the first time ever she'd been _taken_ by her husband, absolutely ravaged, utterly captivated, thoroughly and insanely _used_ by someone who'd transmuted from her gentle husband into a wild, out of control Satyr.

Toward the end she'd been able to do nothing more than lay under him, her breasts bouncing with every hard pound into her until she wasn't confident that he wasn't going to bounce them off. She was sure, halfway through that, that she was going to be thoroughly bruised for the rest of the month if he didn't actually break something.

Whatever had happened on the Sun Deck, he'd taken his pain out in her body, something between ravishment and a month long orgy crammed into an hour.

She'd seen great pain in his eyes and that he'd tried to dispel it through sex, but his pain was so deep that nothing less than wild, insane, berserk sex could touch that depth and she, most often the instigator, this time could not keep up.

In fact, less than halfway through, she'd wondered if she would survive.

In the end, utterly unable to endure or resist the wild man who continued to take her and who gave her such insane passion, she'd lain stunned, weak and helpless to move by the time he'd calmed.

She didn't know how many orgasms he'd brought her to, only knows she lost track of his climaxes - and her own.

x

By the time he was again a twenty first century civilized man she couldn't raise her head from the mattress and closing her legs was impossible without his help.

He'd had to carry her into the shower and the hot water they'd shared as he washed and massaged her thoroughly worn flesh had brought her exhausted and battered body back to some form of life.

She's not sure how bruised, if at all, she is. Checking with a hand mirror after he'd stepped out had revealed nothing, but she's only sure that by now that she must be.

She can think of no English word for what he'd taken her through; seduction, ravishment, orgy, conquest, nothing approaches even the first level of that insanity.

x

After they'd dressed, for her a challenge of epic proportions, she'd clung to his arm as they walked the passageways to this Lounge. She'd tried to make it look to other couples like a loving embrace but the truth was that cooked spaghetti would be stronger than her legs and she wasn't looking forward to sitting down - ever.

She never did find out what had happened on the Sun Deck but she wonders, as she sits down very, very gingerly beside him, if she can convince Mother McGee to yell at him more often.

xx

Tony and Jeanne, when they arrive, sit opposite the McGees, Jeanne opposite Siobhan at the clued in position where the action would be immediately to her left, and Ziva and Abby take the remaining seats, Abby closest to the head, opposite Jimmy. Her sole concern in the seating arrangements was to get closest to the chair at her immediate left.

x

Siobhan, unable to endure the weight of silence any longer, rises and steps the length of the tables behind Abby and around to Jimmy's right beside the vacant chair. She bends low, the distrust in his eyes painful. "James, may I speak to you?" she whispers.

"Iiiii..." He keeps his voice as quiet. Is she going to yell at him again? No, she wouldn't in public, that's why she pulled him away from 'Chelle earlier. And twice for the same offense? Certainly not.

"I'm sorry."

She couldn't surprise him more if she'd slapped him. "What?" He barely keeps his voice private.

"I apologize."

"Wait. I screwed up and you're apologizing?"

"Yes, that was a screw up but that's over. But I called you an idiot and I apologize. No matter what the circumstances, that was uncalled for and I'm sorry."

Still half amazed, all he can think to say is "I forgive you." He sees the relief in her eyes. "Will you forgive me?"

She pats his shoulder. "Long ago, James."

She passes around him and returns to her chair at the opposite corner.

Michelle, none the wiser for the whispers but sure it's about the mystery on the Sun Deck, leans in, being extremely careful how she moves on the chair. "What was that all about?" 'And am I going to get ravaged again after dinner? I'd better eat lightly if he's going to pound me like that again.'

"'Chelle?"

"Yes?"

"How do I understand women?"

This doesn't answer her question - or perhaps it does. All she's sure of is that she's relieved - for now. She needs more time - as in hours stroke days - to recover before they can do anything after that last assault, though she has the feeling he may not give her a choice. She takes his hand. "Don't worry, darling, the good news is that in your next life you have a 50/50 chance of understanding very well." 'And then you'll also know how I feel right now - if you're lucky.'

"Oh." He'd hoped for a straight answer.

"The bad news is that you won't remember having asked the question."

"Thanks," he says, as dejected as when he'd been on the Sun Deck.

She kisses him. "You're welcome."

x

Attention then can't be withheld from the last of the seats, the head chair. "Has anyone any idea where he is?" Ziva asks.

"I haven't seen him in hours," Abby repeats her previous point of their search failure while snacking on a vanilla cookie with the Princess long hair logo upon it, giving the woman a trim. "Not since the game."

"I hope he has not changed his mind," Ziva says.

"You know nothing short of an Executive Order will get Gibbs into the theater," Tony says from opposite Tim. The various uses of MTAC as an illicit movie house should have prepared them for this. "He probably found the woodworker's and is busy building a replica of the Princess."

"Nope, DiNozzo," Gibbs, accompanied by Captain Stubing, says as he passes behind him, having come from the side entrance beside the bar and he sits down in his chair at the head of the table - the perfect vantage point. R. would H.I.P. but Abby had reserved that seat closest to her on his behalf - and her own. "I wouldn't take all their wood; they need it to keep this ship elegant."

Tony casts an annoyed look at Ziva, she'd have to have seen him coming before she spoke, but she returns a teasing smile.

x

" _So_ , I trust you're all enjoying the cruise," Stubing says from behind the Palmers to a broken chorus of agreements and thanks. "I'd like to thank you, Mr. McGee, for bringing that trunk issue to my attention. The matter has been resolved."

"No problem." When he'd visited Tate after the contest, being careful not to be seen by any of her associates, he'd found the mob of trunks had been distributed to their respective owners, Tate's discreetly tucked away in a corner of her cabin.

He'd wanted to be sure there were no problems in completing the script; but once he'd set up a flow yesterday afternoon and had given her a few suggestions, her Writer's Block had no longer been a challenge. She'd completed the rewrite last night and distributed the revised play before retiring to bed.

He considers his first foray as a 'Ghost Writer' to be a success and looks forward to enjoying the result. And now he can focus all his Writing efforts on 'The Other Locked Room'.

"Well then," Stubing says generally to his nine guests, "I hope you enjoy your dinner and the show. I have rounds to make," he says, glancing about the filling room. "Good talking to you, Jethro."

"Likewise, Skipper. Enjoy your evening."

x

Conversation spans a wide range, both general and occasionally quiet between two or three as dinners are served. Siobhan's blessing includes a prayer for the success of the evening as well as a silent plea that no one learns how much of the festivities depend upon prayer. The meals are begun and conversations on how each has spent their day progress, the consensus being that the ship's nickname is appropriately bestowed while the room, generally unnoticed, fills until

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN THERE'S NO MORE ROOM?" a strident voice demands of the Maître d' at the door.

"I am so sorry, Ma'am, we are quite at capacity at the moment."

The outraged complaint and the conciliatory reply had not had to be yelled for everyone in the dining hall to hear; they were carried quite well by speakers in the overhead from microphones in dress collar and behind bow tie. The disturbance at the entrance, and the reply of the harried, tuxedoed Maître d' whom no one quite remembers greeting them, draw all eyes to that spot.

The man is the oldest of the Hannigan Players, with a shock of white hair and a dignified bearing that calls to mind such distinguished actors as Alan Napier, though he's not as tall.

"Well clear one of those tables and Make room," a large woman, hair done up high upon her head with jeweled pins and wearing a blue gown with enough material for three, commands.

"But Madam–"

"I am _not_ a MADAM!" blasts through the room.

Siobhan leans back and nestles into her favorite chest, looks up to whisper in her husband's ear under scattered chuckles. "Couldn't leave that one out, could you?"

He bends down slightly. "It was too perfect," he whispers back, his breath tickles her ear and the lights go out. The palpable blackness presses upon the eyes. After five seconds the lights slowly come back up, but only to half their earlier intensity.

"WHAT IS THIS?" the woman demands as though she's forgotten the microphone. "Can't you even keep the LIGHTS on on this scow?"

x

The lights work their way full up while the Maître d' explains, or attempts to, that "We have been having intermittent power problems all evening. The Engineers are doing their best to locate the–" Another darkness envelopes them, the obsidian mask total.

When the lights force themselves up by half, the woman has reached the middle of the dining hall.

"Madam!" the outraged Maître d' exclaims as he follows her from his station and the lights come back up to their original intensity. The blousy woman whirls fast enough for her gown to fly outward bell-like about her.

"I am _not_ a–" is as far as she gets into his upraised, pleading hands.

" _Please_."

She turns her back to him and stalks into the room, getting close to the round table. "All I want is a little Service, but I can see that's too much to expect on this barge."

"If you would simply be patient for a few min-"

She whirls on him. "A few _minutes_! Do you _know_ who I _am_?"

"Why, don't you?"

Under subdued chuckles the reclining Siobhan backhands Tim's leg and the lights are gone again.

When they slowly work their way up all the seething woman wants to know is "How _dare_ you?"

"I beg your–"

" _I_ am the Duchess Von Bombast."

"May Heaven help the Duke," an unidentified male voice mutters from the overhead speakers.

"Sir," a tuxedoed gentleman seated at a single table next to them, the one to the right of being between the agents' table and the round one beyond, calls to the Maître d', "I am finished my meal," he says as he rises. Anyone with a good angle would see the food upon the table is untouched. "The _lady_ may have my table."

"Thank you, sir," the Master of Waiters says effusively.

"Don't mention it." He strides off toward the bar; adjusting his bow tie and jacket as though proximity to the woman may have damaged them.

Again the hall is plunged into darkness.

x

When the lights work back up again like a boxer fighting his way off the mat the woman is seated in the vacated chair and two Stewards clear the table.

"And now, what would the lady like?" he asks as though hoping to fill an order for arsenic.

"Pheasant under glass," she declares and there's a smattering of chuckles from various parts of the room.

"I am sorry, Ma'am," he pronounces carefully, "we have no pheasant. If you would care to consult a men–"

" _WHAT_? No _Pheasant_? And you call _this_ a _Luxury_ Liner?"

"Oh, give it a rest, will you?" a woman's exasperated mutter comes over quite clearly.

x

"Who said that?" the woman demands, fury launching her to her feet.

A woman with light brown hair turns to her from the 8 o'clock position of an adjacent round table of six. "I did."

There are two men and four women at the table, the men at the 12 and 6 o'clock positions from the agents' vantage, the white gowned woman who spoke closest to the loud Duchess and the three other women are at 2, 4 and 10.

"Who the Hell are _you_?"

The young woman stands up, steps up to her. In white high heels she's only tall enough to reach the other's chin and they confront one another at arm's length. "Someone who's really tired of your complaints. I heard them all yesterday."

"I see," Von Bombast sniffs. "A Commoner."

"Well, there's Common,' she looks her up and down, "and then there's _common_."

"You, girl, are a tramp."

"I'm not a tramp."

"Four women in the presence of two men. What occupation should we think you are pursuing?"

"Now wait a minute," the younger man at the far end of the table protests.

"The only thing I'm pursuing, _Madam_ , is a pleasant dinner, impossible in your presence. I heard you yesterday, you wanted pheasant then and were told they didn't have any. Did you think they were going to fly some in overnight?"

"This does not concern you, strumpet."

"Seems to me you're so loud it concerns the whole ship. They could use you as a fog horn, _Madam_."

The man at the 6:00 position starts to stand up.

"Better than a whore with a disease ridden cunt like yours!"

Her expression telegraphs that that line was not scripted, but after a moment she rallies. "Oh, yeah? Well–"

The crack of left fist against face is loud over the speakers and the small woman is knocked off her high heels by the punch. She's spun about to collide stomach first with the table, doubled over so her face slams into the wood.

Everyone at the table is on their feet with various exclamations and Siobhan sits up and turns to Tim. She doesn't have to ask; his outraged expression is enough.

x

The petite woman pushes herself off the table top, apparently dazed, and she wobbles unsteadily on her high heels, her face bloody. The front of her elegant dress at chest height is filled with food, mostly off-white sauces. She glares at her assailant with eyes that first shine with fear, than flare with furious hatred, blood flowing from nose and mouth to stain her food covered dress.

She puts her hand to her face and her shaking hand smears the blood. She looks at it upon her palm, sees the rest flow onto her ruined gown and her next line is one everyone is sure is not scripted.

"You - _Fucking_ \- _**BITCH**_!" she screams, charges the larger woman and the lights go out.

x

Loud, chaotic noise fills the black room, there's a loud "ACK" and a ' _shish_ ' sound. At the agents' table Jimmy, at Gibbs' left, mutters a quiet "Very convincing."

"LADIES AND GENTLEMEN," a deep voice booms from the speakers, not drowning out the chaos in the center of the room. "WE HAVE HAD A MINOR POWER FAILURE. WE ASK YOU TO KEEP YOUR SEATS UNTIL THE LIGHTS ARE RESTORED."

Ten seconds later, moments after the room has gone silent, the lights force their way from dim to half to bright and reveal the large and previously loud woman laying face down on the floor, to no one's surprise. What is interesting is the spreading red puddle that centers below her chin and expands onto the polished dance floor.

The four women and two men from the large table are scattered from midway between the table the Duchess had used to several feet beyond the round one, none of them close enough to block anyone's view of the large, still woman.

The small woman stands a few feet left, blood on her face still flows from nose and mouth to fall upon the front of her dress, but this time her face and once white gown are covered with blood. In addition to the food stains that had been on her chest there's a vast amount of blood. She looks as though she's been sprayed with it from face to dress hem.

x

One of the women shrieks, the blast nearly blowing out the overhead speakers and most of the audience must clamp hands to their devastated ears.

"Is there a doctor in the house?" the man at the twelve o'clock position cries, not blasting anyone.

"This isn't in the play!" another woman yells, then lowers her voice when she sees the effect of her cry upon their audience. "Somebody help!"

" _We need a Doctor_!" the man at 6 o'clock yells.

Palmer, Benoit and DiNozzo rush from their chairs.

x

The Maître d' beats them to the still body, falls to his knees and grasps her, turns her upward, arms about her before anyone can reach him. "DALE!"

"Get away from her," DiNozzo commands and, when not heeded, bends in to pull the man's bloodied hands away and to haul him upright by his jacket as the doctors reach the body.

The blood spreads wider, the gash in her neck continues to drain when she lands again on her side as more screams, this time from the audience, join the deafening cacophony. It's clear to the doctors that the woman is still alive, or had been before she was grabbed. Blood doesn't flow from the dead.

DiNozzo pulls the white haired man away as Doctor Bricker slides to a halt beside the body from the far side of the room.

It's been only ten seconds since the first scream.

Near the Duchess' feet the petite woman she'd assaulted stands frozen, drenched in a spray of blood, hands pressed to her bleeding mouth. But while everyone else is moving to or away, she doesn't stare at the blood that spreads before the woman but to the floor between them and the bloody steak knife.

The girl looks like she's going to faint, either from fear or lack of air, but she does breathe again when Gibbs' hand closes tight about her arm. The remaining Agents, authoritative commands slamming out and gold shields displayed, block everyone's approach.

The doctors work quickly to staunch the still flowing blood.

x

"LOCK ALL THE DOORS!" Anthony DiNozzo's command fills the room without the need for a microphone. "NO ONE LEAVES!"

"BARBARA," Adam Bricker yells, not looking away from the coordinated efforts, "GET THE GURNEY, MY BAG, EMERGENCY SUPPLIES AND PLASMA!" A moment later the side door by the bar slams against the bulkhead.

"Johnson, Kelven," Merrill Stubing's voice rings out as he approaches from the head of the room, "secure that door!" The two white and black uniformed men move to block the wide main entry and to slide doors from within the bulkhead into place. He looks to the opposite door beside the bar where he'd entered earlier with Gibbs on what was to be a very pleasant evening and which had slammed open a moment before. "Peters, Washington, block that one." He turns to the Emergency door at the stern. "Gonzalez, you have that one."

He looks to the three doctors who surround the body of Dale Hannigan, her face in a wide red pool centered at her neck after the Maître d' had been forced to release her.

Palmer has a cloth pressed to her neck while also holding the woman's right wrist. "No pulse."

Bricker and Benoit coordinate CPR, but after half a minute their efforts slow, a look passes between the three, Palmer pulls the reddened material away and Bricker and Benoit draw back, resting on their heels. No blood flows from the rotund corpse.

"Adam, need I ask?"

"You do not, Merrill."

"She was alive," Benoit declares, "but she lost too much blood too quickly."

Palmer ends it. "She's dead."


	9. Rule Number 1

Chapter Nine  
Rule Number 1

Gibbs keeps a tight grip on the blood spattered woman's arm and sees Michelle snapping pictures of the scene as quickly as her cell phone will process them. He's glad someone brought a camera. The Players, clustered to his left, all exhibit a wide range of grieved shock. "David, over here. DiNozzo, McGee, Palmer, Sciuto," he glances to the members of the cast, the seven of whom have gathered themselves in a silent knot on the far side of the large round table as Palmer continues to take cell phone pictures, "take them to their cabins, read them their Rights. Rule Number One. Confiscate keys, cell phones, tablets, laptops, cabin phones, everything. Abby, can you get fingerprints?"

"I can go really Old School and get you a beautiful set. I need index cards, scotch tape and some number 2 pencils."

"I'll see you're provided with everything you need," Stubing says.

"Thank you. They of course won't help with the bloody knife, there's blood all over the handle, but I'll get them for anything else we find."

"Get to it," Gibbs orders his team, then looks down at the petite woman's bloody hand. Based on what they've seen and heard, and the blood which covers the woman from face to hem, this won't be much of a mystery.

He never trusts the obvious solutions. Somewhere between Investigation and Proof, things often get muddy.

x

" _Wait_ ," Abby says to the agents who take the seven actors into custody, "Before you do anything, I have a box of latex gloves in my cabin. Let me run and get them."

"You brought Crime Scene gloves on a vacation cruise, Abs?" He doesn't care for her saucy smile.

"They have more than one use, Gibbs."

No, he definitely doesn't care for it. "Go." He hands the blood sprayed young woman off to Ziva.

"I didn't do it..." Her lips are the only things that move of her volition as the woman pulls her aside. She moves with heavy, awkward steps on her white high heeled shoes. Her expression is sheer terror, as though she expects Hannigan to get up and strike back.

"You have the right to remain silent," Ziva tells her, continuing the recitation as she pulls the shorter woman with her, slowed only slightly to accommodate her stumbling gait.

x

"I can help," Jeanne Benoit tells Gibbs, looking up from the body. "I'm not needed here, and I know what you need."

A glance to DiNozzo confirms this. It's not unlike ER protocol for sexual assaults; collect, identify and preserve, in this case looking for blood and other evidence. Abby will supervise anyway, so now they have enough women to do the actresses simultaneously - he excludes the priest from his list - while Tim and Tony deal with the four men.

He can't send Palmer, the man's the only one he's confident about in the medical side of things. Adam Bricker and Barbara Copeland, who left for the Emergency stuff and now likely can't get in, may well be competent with the living, but he needs someone who knows the dead.

Stubing sends Lieutenant Smith with the others, most likely to see that things are handled for the Cruise Line's interests. Rather than being irritated at local involvement, this time he's grateful for what assistance the ship's senior officers can provide. This is neither a Naval nor a strictly civilian operation, but he'll treat it as though it were primarily the former.

He sends McGee's wife out through the rear door with the others. She's not an agent nor will she be used as such, since she's made it exceedingly clear on numerous occasions that in her priorities she doesn't consider herself to be under his orders. Then he looks around. Having sent sixteen people away, there are far too many left crowding the room.

"All of you sit down, and if you can, eat your dinners." 'That's not gonna happen, but I'll be interested in who does.' "When my people come back we'll speak to each of you in turn."

So much for Jennifer Shepherd's guarantee.

xx

Ziva does not bring the petite, light brown haired suspect, who'd given her name as Meredith Tate, immediately to her cabin since she'd been informed that the eight survivors of the late 'Hannigan Players' are quartered in a cluster on the Coral deck's port side, two decks below the Crime Scene, numbers 44 through 58 and she wants to be certain the blood spattered young woman does not see, and is not seen by, any of her colleagues.

She instead brings her toward her own cabin on the deck between Crime Scene and Suspects' quarters, one section aft and on the starboard side, Lido 123.

From the moment they left the Acapulco Lounge on the Riviera deck to come down the one deck on the companionway, Tate continued to tremble, so much so that Ziva had to grip her arm firmly as they descended the steps. Elevators were off limits, too much risk of encountering unsuspecting guests in an enclosed space. She thinks Tate, shaking as she is, is unlikely to try anything, but she still stands ready to break the woman's arm if need be.

x

Those who encountered them backed off when the spray of blood on face and dress told a chilling story. The trembling, terrified young woman's face is smeared with blood, both her own now stopped and smeared flow beneath the victim's spray. The front of her white gown is considerably more damaged by blood and food, the former sprayed upon the material from neck to hem; the latter Ziva had seen earlier to be mostly sauces now largely hidden by the gore.

She'd checked the table and Tate had been served Fettuccine Alfredo, most of which she'd been wearing on her chest when she'd pushed herself up from the table. Whatever food fragments had adhered to the front of the dress had long since fallen off, but the dress is not an uncleansible mess, it is evidence in a murder investigation.

When she unlocks and pushes open the door to her cabin, Ziva directs Tate to a wooden chair with only a small cushioned area, this on their left, expecting that the violently shaking girl may fall otherwise. Since all of the blood marking her dress is on the front, there is a limit to how much may be transferred.

"I didn't do anything," she says again, her voice shuddering.

"That is not for me to decide."

x

Tate pushes herself out of the chair and for an instant Ziva prepares for conflict, but her charge's destination is only the mirror on the side wall to the right of the single bed. She gasps when she sees the extent of the damage, particularly the blood first smeared and then sprayed onto her face. She turns to her captor, her eyes wide and tone imploring. "Can't I clean up?"

"Absolutely not." For a moment Ziva is ready to have her wait for examination until they get up to the Coral deck, but decides there is little liklihood of imprisoning the girl in her own cabin adjacent to the other actors when she has what she needs here.

Furthermore, she can see a future wherein Tate will find herself locked into _this_ cabin while she herself moves into close proximity with the other suspects. In fact, knowing Gibbs, he will not permit the girl anywhere near her colleagues, potentially for the rest of the cruise.

She goes to a drawer of her dresser and retrieves her cell phone. It is not as good as the high density Crime Scene camera, but it will record. "Pictures first. Then take off your gown."

The trembling woman's face takes on deeper terror. "What?"

Tate looks like she's shorted out, as though having a woman bring her to her cabin and order her to take off her clothes is somehow not exactly the way it's supposed to be. This hesitation she'll grant her.

In the drawer there's also a large clear plastic bag with white draw strings, intended for laundry. She expects the ship's staff never foresaw this use for it. She hopes the towels in the Head are large enough to adequately support the woman's sense of modesty. "Pictures. Then dress. Off. Bagged. Evidence."

"Of _What_?"

Ziva wonders how Gibbs would respond if she used a head slap to jump start the actress' misfiring brain.

xxx

Abby Sciuto, the de facto Lead Agent in this collection of Evidence in the passageway of the Coral deck, pauses when she gets a call on her cell. She fishes it out of her black draw purse, lifts the black unit's silver bat cover. "Hello? Yes, Ziva." It's a short call, short enough that she only need say "Got it." She closes the phone and turns to Gopher. "I have a problem I hope you can help me with. I have to get something out of Meredith Tate's cabin, but I can't leave yet."

"No problem. Which one is it?"

"Coral 44."

"Oh, yes. I remember."

He remembers?

He leads her to the door to the left of the group and on the left side of the passageway, pulls from his pocket a small number of keys on a half inch ring, chooses one and unlocks the door.

"That was easier than I'd thought. Do you have the keys for every beautiful woman's cabin?" she asks as they enter and shut the door behind them. Hannigan's still locked cabin is to the right of the cluster, number 60, and is on the right side of the passage, making these two the furthest apart in the Players' group. Does the man also have keys to that Cabin?

"I have the keys for every cabin, period," he says, holding up the ten keys. "It's a little known fact, but I can tell you, that every same last digit uses the same key."

Well, that _may_ explain how he remembers, but she doubts it. She expects Gibbs is going to want to know what else this man remembers. But before then, she had better make sure about Hannigan's cabin, not only to ascertain that it's locked but to find some way to ensure that it stays locked.

x

The best way to get a man to reveal more than he's supposed to is by switching which brain he thinks with. She smiles a smile that melts most men, takes his hand in her left hand and slowly strokes the back of his hand with her right fingertips. "Who else has these keys?" she breathes.

"Oh, for Security reasons, just me and the Captain."

"So you..." she slows her stroking, lowers her voice, "could walk into _my_ cabin, Lido 57, any... time... you... please."

"Well, the Captain takes a very dim view of that sort of thing."

Does he now? But this man's memory is so good. "Even if _I_ take a bright view?"

"It looks like things are starting to brighten up." Her smile widens, but he doesn't know it's her 'gotcha' smile. "But you won't tell anyone about that, will you? I could get in a lot of trouble if anyone–"

She hooks her finger into his shirt behind his bow tie. "We'll keep this just between us." She pulls him closer. "Lido 57."

"My favorite cabin," he assures her before their lips meet.

xx

Two crewmen are in the passageway when she and Smith come out, she having gathered clothing to be scooped up later when she finishes supervising the evidence collection.

Captain Stubing has assigned the men to this post in the passageway beside the Coral 44-60 series, none of which cabins interconnect, to ensure that the Cast, whose door locks are controlled from the inside, do not attempt to leave yet that their needs are met. Until any or all of them are officially arrested and charged with a crime, they remain guests of the Princess Cruise Line, to be treated accordingly. Their activities can be circumscribed but no more.

As each of the Agents complete his or her tasks they head back to the Riviera Lounge, except for Benoit who seeks out the Sick Bay. The autopsy would most likely be done there, probably the first time ever that the suite was used for that purpose. It's going to be a long night of Interviews but for the moment Gibbs is doing it alone.

Abby, however, makes certain before she departs, a bundle of clothes in her arms, that the late Dale Hannigan's Cabin 60 remains off limits to everyone but the NCIS Agents. She knows the Captain can override that, but she'll talk to Gibbs about solving that problem.

xx

In the meantime, the interviews of the dinner guests have begun at the far end of the room, the tables at the stern being furthest from the action. Gibbs takes identifications, cabin assignments and statements, but doesn't expect these to yield much. There are, however, over a hundred people in the room and he wants the excess bodies gone.

Stubing joins him on these interviews and, while he doesn't want him along, the man may well be useful. He doesn't know if the Skipper has any skills in Investigation but the man knows his ship and can compel truth from his crew. Furthermore, if the time must come when he must make a break with the Captain, he wants a history of cooperation first.

He does learn some useful information from the Shipmaster. No one left during the time the lights were out. No light could enter through the windows black curtained for this event and conditions were such that experienced crewpersons with years of familiarity with the room could have traversed it undetected through a confused crowd only with the greatest of difficulty.

That's why he begins his sweep at the furthest point from the murder, at least until his agents return, and sends each interviewed person out through the guarded stern door in turn. It's unreasonable to think that a guest could cross the unfamiliar room, cut Dale Hannigan's throat in such a way as to transfer no evidence that could escape his close observation and make it back to his or her seat unnoticed before the lights could be brought up at an unpredictable moment.

Finally, the possibility that a guest would have a motive for killing Hannigan is vanishingly small in comparison to the probability of people who knew her for years having said motive.

Even after the Agents return one by one from their respective duties to assist in the interviews, it's a slow process to thoroughly cover over a hundred passengers and crew, the last of the remote passengers reached being the least accommodating.

xxx

After delivering a double armload of clothes to Ziva in Lido 123, Abby goes to the next forward quarter and opens cabin 57. She confirms she has her traveling lock, which had been guaranteed by the manufacturer to secure any door even before she'd improved it. She sets it on the table beside the door and goes in search of Gibbs.

Since she knows exactly where he is and what he's doing, she grants it's not much of a search. She finds him with the Captain and one of the isolated passengers, waits on the fringes until the conversation winds down, and before he can move on to the next one: "Gibbs, I need to tell you something."

"What is it?"

She looks to Stubing.

"I'll go see how your other Agents are getting on," the man says but Abby halts his departure.

"I need you to do something," Abby says.

"Of course."

"I asked your crew to make sure no one but NCIS Agents get into Coral 60, but all I could do was ask."

"Say no more." He turns to a Lieutenant, already interviewed but standing by, and directs him to pass that word to the crew. Then he heads toward the other side of the room where McGee conducts interviews of the serving staff who had changed Hannigan's table.

x

When they're alone she pulls a pair of latex gloves from her drawstring black purse and hands them to him. "Gibbs, I'm not saying it means anything - yet - but there are only ten cabin locks on this ship."

"Meaning?" He sees Ziva enter through the guarded main door, knows she has secured their chief suspect.

"It's a ship secret," Abby says, "but the door locks repeat numerically. The Captain and the Purser, Lieutenant Smith, have a full set of only ten keys that'll open any cabin on the ship. Now that's probably very fine, I'm not questioning that. For safety reasons it's probably a good idea."

"NCIS uses it too. The Director has twenty keys that access the whole building."

"See? But the upshot, something I promised never, ever, ever to let slip loose–"

"Until I ordered you."

"Thanks, Gibbs, is that they don't want the passengers to know that they can do it too. If your Cabin number ends in three, your key opens any other three on the ship."

She pulls a handful of luggage name tagged keys from her black drawstring purse, all but one rubber banded together in pairs. "That means that until we took them Meredith Tate and Judy Paulsen could get into each other's cabins, Ann Stern and Michael Simmons could make illicit visits - if they knew. Peter Finch and Dale Hannigan could too. And Erika King and Harold McCabe could walk in on each other."

"Who's left?" he asks. The tag on the last key is upside down in her hand.

She turns it over. "Charles Maxwell."

"Boring trip for him."

" _Yeah_." But then she sobers, seeing by the gleam in Gibbs' eyes that he caught her out. "I'm not implying anything happened, after all it's not common to go around looking to see who else's door your key opens, and I didn't even find out until after I had all their keys."

"Good work, Abs."

"I aim to please. And now I'd better aim toward finding someplace to become an FSA."

"And that is?"

"Forensic Scientist Afloat, silly."

"Talk to the Skipper."

"Right."

x

"Boss, you're gonna want to hear this," DiNozzo calls from the far end of the room as Abby steps away.

"What've you got?" he asks as he crosses the room past the remaining guests, the ones closest to the scene, and steps up to the raised level and to the second of two small tables. The position of this table, elevated and bordered by flowers on the ledge beside it, allows a clear view of the Crime Scene and the large round table beside it. It is fore of that table, seen from the starboard side.

"This is Robert and Ann Bronne," Tony says of the middle aged couple, "of Round Mountain, Nevada. This is their thirtieth anniversary cruise."

"And could have gone better," Robert gripes to the tall man beside their table.

"Yes, sir. Would you tell Special Agent Gibbs what you and your wife saw?"

" _I'll_ tell them, Bobbie," Ann commands. "You'll get everything mixed up."

"I will not. I know what I saw."

"Just like you saw that little tramp at the–"

" _HEY_!" Gibbs' bark silences the argument with surprise. He supposes that not many people yell at the couple.

When he has their attention he reminds them that "We have a dead woman in Sick Bay. What did you see?"

"I saw that bloodied woman kill the loud one."

"You saw it?"

"Clear as day," Ann insists.

"It was dark as night."

"Well, I mean I didn't _see_ her stab her, but I did see the knife in her hand."

"You saw the knife." None of the agents had, the angle was bad, Tate partially blocked by Hannigan for those on the column's right.

A quick check of his notebook sketch shows the Bronnes had a view of Tate, who was at the eight o'clock position, through their angle between Michael Simmons at the twelve o'clock position and Erica King at the two.

"Sure I saw it. Right in that small woman's hand just before the lights went out. She snatched it up from the table and charged that other woman.

"Then the lights went out and, when they came on, the big woman was dead and her blood was all over the little one."

x

"Gibbs," Ziva calls. When he looks to her she's crouching beside the table where Hannigan was seated, the edge of the floor length table cloth in her gloved hand. They hadn't focused on the Crime Scene yet because they wanted the excess people interviewed and gone, but it's clear that Ziva has made a discovery.

Turning the Bronnes back over to Tony, he steps down from the elevated deck, crosses the room and looks under the table. A large steak knife lies there, blood upon the blade.

His eyes shift to the bloody spot on the dance floor behind him between the small square and large round table where the murder weapon had lain at Meredith Tate's feet. After she was taken away Gibbs himself had photographed the bloody weapon with his cell phone and then wrapped the knife in a large napkin from another table. A Steward had brought a set of large draw string plastic bags and the napkin is still rolled around the blade and sits at the end of the table where McGee and DiNozzo had sat with their ladies.

Ziva looks from the knife to him. "Are we certain it is only one murder we are investigating?"

x

Gibbs signals for Stubing, who has been watching intently, to come over. In the meantime he looks closely at the bloody knife. It looks just like the other bloody knife.

"What is it, Jethro?"

"Is this one of your knives?"

"No. We don't use that design. But didn't you...?"

Gibbs crosses the few steps to the end of the agents' table, unbags and unrolls the napkin from around it, careful not to touch the knife even with gloved hands. "One wound on one dead woman," Stubing says, "and two identical bloody knives."

DiNozzo is on his other side. "You sure you only have one dead body on your ship, Captain?"

"I think I'd better check."

"Do not bother," Ziva advises. She takes the second knife from Gibbs in her gloved hand, runs it along the white table cloth. Instead of the material being cut, it bleeds.

"Not again," Gibbs appeals.


	10. Rule Number 31

Chapter Ten  
Rule Number 31

The Interviews of the passengers and crew who'd been present in the Riviera Lounge when Dale Hannigan, late of the Hannigan Players traveling troupe of actors, had been murdered are complete. That process took over two hours but the large ballroom is now vacated save for five NCIS Agents. Gibbs considers his resources. Doctors Palmer and Benoit are in the Sick Bay doing as much of an Autopsy as the suite can accommodate, Abby strives to set up a Forensics Lab in whatever space the Captain allotted to her with whatever resources she can improvise and he doesn't care where Reverend McGee is.

"McGee, get on that Web thingy and tell us who these people are."

"Yes, boss."

"Looks pretty clear that Tate did it," DiNozzo says. "Open and shut case, boss?"

"How many have we had?"

"Three, but really two because the last fell apart."

"And the last before that was when Ducky got stabbed in the hand." That one had been the close of one case, the simultaneous opening of another and had been enough years ago.

"I don't think she could've done it," McGee protests.

"She knew exactly when the lights would go out," Tony points out. "She wrote it that way."

"No, she didn't."

x

Gibbs knows that tone. He's heard it too many times and never likes what it leads to. "What are you saying, McGee?"

"She didn't write, well, all of it. Not enough to plan a murder."

"What does that mean?"

"Boss, she came to me yesterday for help. Her script was pretty bad and she needed me to work out some problems. Her version didn't have the lights going off and on, so any plans to use them could only be concocted since yesterday."

Gibbs is about to devastate him but Tony is faster. "McWordsmith, our little Knight in shining typewriter ribbon."

"Tony, that didn't even make sense."

Gibbs' nose nearly touches his. "How much did you write, McGee?"

"Ummm, everything you saw. Except that final insult - you saw how it caught Tate off guard, and especially not that punch. That definitely wasn't put in by either of us."

"Considering Tate went Nova," DiNozzo says, "I'm inclined to agree."

Gibbs looks like he wants to walk out, but this isn't a play he can get a refund for. He does, however, want that script. "Who was the murderer in your version?"

"The character's name was Olga Melentnikov, but I don't know the name of the one who played her. She was supposed to slit Hannigan's throat while Hannigan was at her table and be back in her seat at the round table when the lights came back up. The murder weapon was supposed to be found where Ziva found it, under the table. I didn't think I should change too much of Tate's original plot. Besides, I only had two hours or so to discuss the details with Tate about what she would write after that first scene. Shav was waiting for me at the pool."

"Your wife was waiting for you." This is getting to be too much.

"She'd excused herself because there was no room in the cabin." Then he rallies. "But she's also the one who invoked Rule Number 31."

"Rule Number 31."

"Well, actually about the play. I was discussing the original script with her and the killer was obvious five minutes into the thing - obvious to everyone but the Detective, that is."

"Maybe you should've left it like that," Tony quips.

"You're both right," Gibbs announces. "I want to talk to her first. She a good writer, McGee?"

"I think she has potential. Why?"

"Because Rule Number 31 fits. No one intentionally sets herself up as the only possible suspect when she's two hundred miles and twelve hours from a getaway."

xxx

Lido Starboard 123, Ziva's cabin before her unscheduled move up one deck, across and one section forward to Coral Port 44, is where Meredith Tate is sequestered behind a guarded door, the crewman relieved of all other duties during his shift.

After briefly reviewing what McGee had downloaded and printed about the Players in the Business Office and reading the scripts they'd confiscated when they'd imprisoned the Players, the team enters Tate's rather comfortable cell. She hurries to Tim, but he takes her hands between his and seats her down on the foot of the bed and quietly advises her to answer Gibbs' questions as honestly as she can.

"But I didn't do anything!"

After Ziva had taken many photos, she'd been allowed to shower and to dress in some of the clothes Abby had delivered; fresh underwear, white shorts and blue tee shirt. More will be packed and traded later. Everything she'd worn had been bagged, then rebagged separately and labeled as evidence in Abby's makeshift and woefully stocked 'Crime Lab', an unused office on the Promenade deck.

Her hair, previously put up in an elegant coif, is now back in her loose shoulder stroking style.

She sits on the end of the bed, hands shaking and breath short as she faces the Inquisitor as Tim, Tony, Michelle and Ziva file into spaces by the head of the bed, the men on her right and women to her left. They stand out of sight of the trembling woman.

Meredith, white faced, stares at her Interrogator in mounting terror, as though she expects him to pull a gun and put a bullet through her forehead.

x

Gibbs brings the chair from the bureau before her and sits down. If he wanted her frightened he'd have to admit that part came out excellently; the girl's trembling, wide eyed and panting, her breath chaotic. She holds her hands on her bare legs, fingers interlaced but she can't still her hands. If he said 'BOO' he thinks she might faint.

But while he wants her off balance and nervous, he doesn't want her consumed by terror - yet.

He sits back, his body language emphasizing comfort but the signal is lost on the small woman. Michelle, at 5'5" is the smallest on his team but he'd taken Tate, when he'd restrained her and now when they arrived for this Interview, to be 5'1", smaller even than Samantha Sky.

"You wrote 'Murder on the High Seas'?"

"Y - yes," she whispers, sounding like her mouth is dry. Gibbs signals to the women behind her, Michelle enters the Head and returns a moment later with a glass, which she gives to the trembling woman. "Thank you," she says, her voice having shrunk in just the few moments.

She takes a deep breath, holds it until it must hurt, lets it out slowly and turns to her right, looks over her shoulder at McGee and gradually manages to fight the fear down. "Yes," she says louder, drinks a sip of the water, turns back to Gibbs. "Kind of. Almost. Most of–. That is I kind of wrote it. I wrote most of it." She looks right, back to her collaborator. " _Help_ ," she pleads.

"You're doing fine."

"McGee." He says nothing more aloud but his message is explicit. "Tell me about it," Gibbs says, pulls her forward.

"Tell you what?" she whispers, voice stolen.

"Everything. The script. The rewrite. The play."

x

Barely audible but louder with each sip until her voice is almost normal, she takes them through the original idea, confesses her appeal to McGee, explains their collaboration on the story and his advice, the work they had done and how when McGee had gone she'd locked the door and spent the rest of the day rewriting everything and distributed the revised script just before going to bed.

As she tells the tale her fear gradually diminishes, or she gains control over it. It's too soon to determine this with an actress. Perhaps she recognizes these five people, four rather who are vouched for by Tim, aren't here to hurt her. At any rate, by the time the story ends she can speak normally. She still keeps her hands clenched about the glass on her lap, but seems to have focused her control on the tightness of her grip. The water quivers, betraying her still shaking hands.

"Everything was redone?"

"Practically."

"Who was the victim the first time?"

"I didn't change that. It was always to be the Duchess Von Bombast; Hannigan."

"You hated her."

"Y– No. Yes. _But I didn't kill her_."

"Why did you hate her?"

"No. I- I- I–." Her voice locks behind her open mouth.

x

"Tell me about what happened when you came aboard." It's a gamble. He'd heard there was an undefined incident with the troupe from some of the diners and, knowing Hannigan's personality, he's certain she'd been at the center of it.

"We weren't on board five minutes when she started in on me, humiliating me so loudly the entire deck could hear it."

"Over what?"

"We'd sent on ahead the poster boards I'm sure you saw?" Gibbs nods, "The Playbills and headshots of each of us. The Cruise Director put, along with Hannigan as the owner, my picture on the sign in the main lobby. She figured since I was the Author my picture belonged up there in the main room where everyone came in. It _did_. But I didn't have ten seconds to be flattered - my face on a billboard right where people boarded - when she started in on it. You'd think it was - well anyway she made them take _my_ picture down. Charlie Maxwell's picture was put up instead."

"Nice woman."

"I worked _hard_ on that script. I deserved a few seconds out of it."

"Must've made you pretty mad."

"It made me humiliated! Again! She always goes out of her way to humiliate me! Everyone coming aboard could see. She was making me like shit in front of dozens of passengers and officers; a Commander, a Lieutenant and the Cruise Director. It was all I could do not to break down crying then and there. Oh, she'd've had an orgasm over _that_."

x

"So what happened?"

She takes another sip, manages to steady her voice. "This morning Julie McCoy, the Cruise Director - have you met Julie?" He nods. "She's so sweet. She'd retrieved my picture and she had the ship's Photographer print _fifty_ copies. She dropped them off this morning at my cabin upstairs and said I should use them to look for another job."

That hadn't been what he was leading to, he wanted the rest of that incident. Does it follow a pattern that's motive for murder? He'll come back to it.

"Are you going to? Now that there's no more group?" There is no Hannigan in the Hannigan Players anymore, so he expects seven actors - excluding the one who's going to jail - will need headshots.

Tate looks at him with the best blank face he's seen in a while and he wonders how much of it is artifice and how much is that this is the first time she's realizing that she's out of work. "I don't know."

"Something to think about."

"Yes. Presuming I'm not going to prison."

"That's something to think about too."

x

"How did you get involved with the Hannigan Players."

"Why?"

"Seems to me it was a rough life. You could've had an easier time with someone else. At least you'd have some respect."

"Oh, the others are fine. Most of them, I mean. You know, I auditioned with them because they _were_ small. They'd just lost a member and I was just out of College."

"Acting School?"

"No, that was my Minor. I Majored in Business Management; I have a Master's Degree. I figured I could use my Acting to get in the door, then when I was in I'd use what I knew to do more and more of the Business side. I wanted a Career in Theatrical Management, figured I could work my way in, then up. _Fat_ _Chance_."

"What happened?"

"As soon as she found out I was interested in the Business side - like an idiot I went to her before I fully knew what she was - I'd suggested some Management ideas, ways to help the business, you know? She started treating me as the lowest dunce in a class of morons. Nothing I said, nothing I did or could do was good. Not only did she shoot down everything I did or said, she sabotaged the things I did manage to do."

"Anyone else in the group know about your Degree?"

"Of course. She loved to belittle me about it in front of everyone. Her favorite line was that I earned my Degree in managing a _Brothel_."

"'I am not a Madam'," Tim says.

She turns to him, fear forgotten but long building outrage hitting a peak. "You know, a story she spread around came back around to me through a friend - 'Off-Broadway' isn't isolated, we have friends we Network with - that she 'rescued' me out of a whore house and _gave_ me a job where my legs would be closed at least once in a while, but she couldn't break me of loving that life so much."

"Nice lady," Gibbs says, pulling her forward. If anyone tried that with someone he cared about...

"'Lady' and 'Hannigan' are never used in the same sentence."

"Why did you put up with it?" DiNozzo really wants this answer.

She turns back. "Because two parts of that lie are true. I love the Theater life - _and she was_ not _going to break me_."

x

"All right." Gibbs says, pulling her forward once again. "Let's start with who's who." 'And with calmer things.' "How long have you been with them?"

"Since last August. A little more than two more weeks make a year. The tenth."

He and his team have already studied everything available on the group, but there wasn't a significant amount about the Players themselves. Most of their press was on their plays, most of that having been compiled from Bing and Google and printed out in the Business Office. The Players' website goes into everyone a bit deeper, accomplishments and so forth, but he finds it significant that she says she's been with the Troupe for a year and the site doesn't even mention her.

He hates the fact that they can't access the kind of information they would from DC, but Judges with jurisdiction are thousands of miles distant.

Still, he'll have his people work their magic later. For now they'll see how closely reality matches hype. "Tell me who the others are."

"Yes, sir." Again another drink. She visibly forces her shoulders down. "Pete Finch was the Maître d'. He loves to do the stuffy roles, the British Gentleman's Gentleman sort of thing." Gibbs recalls Abby and Michelle had each compared the white haired man to Alan Napier, 'Alfred Pennyworth' from the 60's Batman series, though not as tall. It's one of the few references he got; Kelly had doted on reruns of that show.

x

"Charlie Maxwell was the Detective. I don't know a lot about writing a detective so I took everything Tim said and used it." She tries to cast a grateful smile back to him but it falls under the weight of suspicion of murder.

"At the head of the table, consider it closest to where the Captain was sitting because all the action was at the foot so he'd be facing them, was Mike Simmons. He didn't have a lot to do tonight because he was furthest away, but I was going to switch him and Harry up in the Wednesday performance."

Simmons is closer to Tate's age, they're the two youngest in the group and Finch the oldest.

"Anyway, to his left was Erika King. To her left was Judy Paulsen. Now she was _supposed_ to be the actual murderess. Her character was Olga Melentnikov and this was a political hit against the Duchess Von Bombast."

"I loved that one, by the way," Tony says from behind, obliging her to look back over her right shoulder to him. "You had her down. She didn't even have to act."

"No, she didn't," is all Tate says before turning back to Gibbs.

x

Tony had been hoping for a 'she was a bitch, I'm glad she's dead', but there's time. Hardly anyone implicates herself in the first hour, but the night is young - or would be if it weren't 2307, nearly four hours since the murder.

"Harry McCabe was at the foot of the table and I was next to him. I was supposed to be the suspect because I confronted her."

"Bet that felt really good," Tony cuts in again, intent upon distracting her. It's a tried method, have her answer questions from behind and ahead to keep her off balance. They don't often get to do it in Interrogation, but here they'll make the best of it.

She looks back. "You have _no_ idea."

"Tell me," he invites. 'I welcome all the self-incrimination I can get.'

"She deserved a thousand times more than I could say in a few lines. There's no way I could give her what she deserved in one script. Tim told you about the trunks I always have to deal with? That's the tip of the iceberg in what that bi–!" She looks more closely at the two Agents' faces, turns about to see the other two, then looks back to Tony. "I don't think I want to say any more."

"Might be a good idea," Gibbs grants, pulling her attention up front. "But that's only seven. Who was between you and Simmons?"

"Ann Stern. I wanted her to sit where Erika was."

To those trained to read expressions, body language and voices, Tate might as well have launched a rocket.

"Tell me about her."

Eyes, position, the rocket's still climbing. Tate's hesitation is brief, but compared to how she spoke of the others it's very telling. "She's one of the Players, Hannigan's protégé, thinks she's in charge."

Tate's voice says far more than her words do, but Gibbs knows he must temper his perception with the sustained awareness that this woman is an actress. She's trained, and paid, to project what she wants to project. Time to put perceptions into words that can't be hidden behind.

"You don't like her."

She takes another sip of the water. "Far as I'm concerned, she's a mini-Hannigan, or wanna-be. She sabotages all my efforts as much as Hannigan does, throws her weight around with the others like she's in charge whenever Hannigan leaves the room. But she gets her way since Hannigan rubber stamps everything she does. I've always suspected the trunks were her idea."

"What's in those trunks?" A very effective technique he doesn't often use, so this is good practice, is distraction in subject; to not let a subject grow comfortable on any path without unexpectedly changing course.

"Every prop, every stitch of clothing, everything we need to go on and _I_ have to take care of it."

"Big burden."

"Everything that bitch did to me was a big burd–"

She shuts herself up, then looks back to McGee, her only... whatever... in the room. "You know," she returns to Gibbs, "I don't think I want to say any more until I talk to a lawyer."

x

Gibbs stands up, leads the others to the door at the left bulkhead. "I'm innocent." No one answers her. Gibbs knocks on the cabin door. She sets the glass down on the deck. "I can prove it." The door unlocks, he opens it and she virtually leaps next to him. "Don't you want to know how?"

"Law's specific and clear," he tells her. "You asked for a Lawyer; we can't ask you anything more or even talk to you until you have one."

" _We're in the water outside Mexico_!"

"Doesn't matter. You asked for one."

"Suppose I take it back!"

He presses the door, the Seaman closes and relocks it. "Palmer?"

Michelle comes up to them. "You _can_ withdraw your request for a Lawyer. You can even waive your right to one and speak freely. But _as_ a Lawyer I advise you to be very careful. As Ziva told you, anything you say can and will be used against you in Court. We're not going to gang up on you or railroad you, but whatever you say we're free to use."

"You're a Lawyer, you say?"

"Yes, which is why I advise you to get a good one who'll look after your interests."

"Would you represent me?"

x

It's too frequent a thing, Michelle will admit only to herself, when something in this life they lead leaves her at a loss for words. NCIS is a demanding and occasionally cruel life, but nothing she's encountered lately has left her as stupefied as these four words and the utter naiveté that prompted them.

She's a Lawyer and could legally work the other side, the Defense side, but she's not a Lawyer who's a Federal Agent, she's a Federal Agent who's a Lawyer.

"No. I can't. I can advise you on how to access a Lawyer, even way out here, but that's the limit."

She turns to McGee, looks up the distance into his eyes - even the Lawyer's taller than she is and among three towering people she's really feeling it. "Tim, you helped me-"

"I helped you with a script, and I was happy to do it. You were getting the short end of a thorny stick. But as to this–"

"Can I _choose_ which questions I answer?"

"Absolutely," Michelle tells her.

"That's the famous Fifth Amendment," Tim says. "You don't have to answer anything you feel will hurt or will self-incriminate you."

She turns back and up to Gibbs. "Then I want to cooperate."


	11. Liar!

Chapter Eleven  
Liar!

Meredith Tate sits at the foot of the bed, Gibbs resumes his position in the chair facing her, the others return to the back bulkhead at the head of the bed, again unseen. She picks up the empty glass from where she'd set it on the floor, looks back left. "May I have some more?"

When the drink is presented, Gibbs pulls her attention forward. "McGee told us about some of the things you put up with. Why did you?"

She tries to answer, finally looks down, finding much of interest in the glass on her lap. "The truth..." She takes a deep breath, eases it out slowly, still can't look up. "The truth is I'm a coward." Blushing with shame, she looks back to Tim. "I'm thinking you noticed that."

He doesn't answer, recalling their first meeting. 'Yes, I know you're a coward' isn't something easily or politely said, not even, or especially, to someone who knows it.

She gives up, turns back to Gibbs, her face red.

"I tried a hundred, a thousand times to stand up to her, but I never could. She's hated me from the day I met her, even before I offered to help with Management, and I could never figure out why. It's like I have this 'hate me' spell that some witch cast on me." Behind her Tony gives Michelle a grin, she replies with a finger. "I tried to square things, impossible. I tried to make friends, impossible. I tried to _stand up to her_ , a million times impossible.

"I think she took the fact that she knew I was afraid and used it to make things worse."

"You stood up to her tonight."

"I finally had a way. I was acting so for the very first time it was a role and I was playing off a script - my script - but I could say what I wanted and she couldn't do a thing about it because I also cast her as the dead body - Von Bombast - and I was going to get a tiny bit of satisfaction and there was nothing she could do about it.

"And then she called me a diseased pussied whore and beat the Hell out of me."

If that's what she considers one punch... well, to her it might as well have been. That's likely how she'll remember it in years to come.

x

"And then what happened?"

"I lost it. I was laying over the table, knew I was too cowardly to face her outside of a script - then I got up and saw the blood on my favorite gown I'd brought out just for the play, on my hand, felt it all over my face and suddenly eleven months just came out of me. I didn't care about the script, I didn't care about my job - all I cared about was _ripping her face off and shoving it up her ass_!"

An interesting image, and while he's inclined to think she might be a calm and lucid coward, is she also a hot and riled wildcat?

"Did you?"

"Did I what?"

"Rip her face?" He hadn't seen any scratches, but Palmer is still doing the autopsy, or such as can be done in the Sick Bay.

"I don't know. I thought I did before she grabbed my wrists, then I felt her blood spray on me."

Gibbs signals to Ziva, sends her out. He wishes her luck in finding something that can substitute for their Evidence Collection Kits aboard this ship.

"I didn't kill her!"

x

He decides a less emotional tack will yield results before he bears down. "How many of you actors are there?"

"Nine." She says it like the count should be obvious and easy.

It is; he knew the answer hours ago and that's what led to the problem he has. Though they had seemingly accounted for all of them: "Yourself, Hannigan, the five at your table, Finch the Maître d', Maxwell, the Detective who gave up his table..."

"That's it."

"Who handled the lights?" They had gone off and on at precise times for specific durations. In his copy of the script everything had been spelled out in the Stage Directions.

"I'm not sure. That wasn't for me to decide. Charlie Maxwell was supposed to arrange it. You'd have to ask him."

x

"Tell us about the knife."

She takes another drink. "Yes. That's what makes no sense."

That's not what he's expecting. "Why not?"

"Because it's not even sharp. It's a theatrical knife, made to look like a steak knife, but it doesn't have an edge or a point. What it does have is a reservoir, which you fill with fake blood. When you draw it across say a throat or a wrist it lets the fake blood out through the dull edge."

Yes, that was the knife found under Hannigan's table, and he'd recognized the device immediately; not that specific style of weapon but the idea. It had been memorably shown to him, heart stoppingly so, years ago by Abby while they were investigating the two women who ran a pay for porn site out of their homes, and one of them had supposedly had her throat slit by such a weapon.

He'll never forget, and it took him a while to forgive, that horrific moment when Abby, proclaiming she could no longer live with NCIS, had snatched up the blade and cut her own throat, rivulets of blood trailing down her neck.

He'd nearly leapt upon her, life saving methods flashing through his mind.

But that's not the knife that interests him.

x

"How many of those knives do you have?"

"What? Just the one, of course. Stern was a budget troll. If it worked, there was no need for a second. Even if it didn't - you have no idea what it was like having to be responsible for props but if something needed repair or replacement and I went for the authorization or the money Stern would torpedo it. It looks good, that's all that's necessary. And since Hannigan listened to Stern, who always considered herself second in command on the days she wasn't first, my hands were tied more often than a bondage model's.

"But I was still 'responsible', so I got picked on whenever something wasn't perfect."

"So you kept track of the fake knife, kept it working, filled, that sort of thing."

"I told you I was responsible for _all_ the props, and if the Players went in for anything it was props, because you never knew what was in the next script. Two store rooms are full of junk."

"Why that design? I've seen a fake knife before, it didn't look like that."

"Oh. They make all kinds. That matched one of the most common real knife designs, just a plain black handle and blade. There are millions of the real things, plain and simple."

"Did you choose it?"

"Me? No way. They've had it for years."

"What about the knife you had?"

She blinks up at him, confusion plain on her face. "Not me, Judy had it. She was to cut Hannigan's throat, then push it under that table and get back to her seat before the lights came up. Charlie was supposed to find it when he came back from the bar when the Duchess was found dead in her chair, face down on the table."

"I'm not talking about that knife; I'm talking about the one at your feet."

"Yes, I know. It wasn't supposed to be out on the floor, it was–"

"The one that killed Hannigan. It was a real knife and you had it in your hand when you charged her before the lights went out." So said the Bronnes.

"What? No. I - The knife is fake. No edge, it can't cut anything."

"No, it was identical to the fake, but it was real. It killed Hannigan and witnesses put it in your hand."

" _What_?"

x

"You charged Hannigan with the real knife, slit her throat with it, then dropped it when you got sprayed with her blood."

She jumps to her feet. " _Did Not_!"

"Sit down."

"NO! I didn't have the knife. When I saw the blood I wanted to get my fingernails into her face and rip it off!"

"Several witnesses say you had the knife in your hand."

"They're _liars_!" she cries, color high in her face.

"All of them?" He has only the two, but several is more unsettling to the guilty.

"I didn't have a knife! I didn't!"

"Sit down."

"NO!" She stomps her foot, her face deep red now. "I didn't have the knife, I didn't cut her throat, I wanted to rip her face off! THEY'RE LIARS! I DIDN'T DO–!"

Gibbs stands very quickly and she shrieks. The glass flies up from her hand in a spray of water as she runs away along the right side of the bed. She evades Michelle who's hardly much taller than she is. The glass lands upon the carpet by the front door as she huddles into the corner rear beside the Head. "DON'T _HURT_ ME!" she pleads, cowering against the bulkhead, hands up close to her face to protect herself from Gibbs. "DON'T _HIT_ ME! I DIDN'T DO IT! _I DIDN'T DO IT_!"

As Gibbs and the other agents stare in varied stages of disbelief, Meredith slumps to the floor, weeping, huddled into a tight ball. "Don't hurt me. Please don't hurt me. I didn't do it. I didn't do it! _I didn't do it_!"

x

Gibbs signals Michelle, who steps closer to the crying woman, but stops and looks back to him.

"Palmer?"

When Tate looks up, tears streaming down her cheeks, Michelle slowly backs away, and Tate turns from her and the huge man. She's trembling, her breath shattered into gasps and sobs, red faced now at being unable to do other than expose her weakness to four strangers.

When Michelle's beside the senior agent she whispers "Sir, this is no act. She may be an actress but this is real. She's absolutely terrified."

"Of getting caught?" He's backed hundreds of suspects into that corner though never so dramatically. That had doubled his suspicion of the actress.

"No, sir. That would be calculated, this is primal. It's not the fear of someone who's backed into a wall, this is... cave type terror. It's like when you stood up she _knew_ you were going to murder her."

Gibbs doesn't say anything, so she slowly advances again to the crying woman. "Meredith? No one's going to hurt you, honey." She kneels down on one knee, extends her hand. "Come on, honey."

The woman gradually fights down the tears, but Michelle can feel her fear. It's not as bad as it had been; that was like the detonation of an emotional torpedo against her hard pressed psychic shield.

"I'm sorry," Meredith whispers.

"It's okay, honey." She holds her hand still, and eventually Tate fights the break well enough to take it, but she clutches Michelle's hand as though it were a lifeline against drowning in her tears. "Let's go inside," she says softly, eyes flicking to the Head door beside them.

She puts a protective arm about the trembling woman's shoulders, helps her to rise, brings her through the door, then snaps the lock sharply for the effect.

x

DiNozzo steps to Gibbs. "She was berserk at the play," he says quietly, unsure how much might pass through the door. "But I'm having a hard time believing she could do the deed and be on her feet when the lights came on."

Gibbs remembers Ziva's report when she'd returned from escorting Tate to her own cabin. 'She was clearly terrified,' the Mossad officer had said, 'when I brought her down to my cabin. Rather than dealing rationally with the seriousness of her situation, she had retreated into shock, disbelief and a detached, confused state. I nearly administered a head slap to jump start her misfiring brain.'

Gibbs had wondered if he had to coin a new rule. 'Acting?' he'd asked.

'If she were that good an actress, she would not be with the Hannigan Players.'

x

Gibbs sees McGee is staring at the Head door, a troubled look on his face. "You got something to say?"

"I noticed it too, boss, when we first met. She was desperate for help and too scared to ask. She about talked herself out of asking if not for Shav, then tried to run away rather than ask. I don't see her able to plan an elaborate murder overnight with the changes in the lights, go through with it and, as Tony said, be on her feet at the end."

x

The door opens to admit Ziva, who carries a handful of small plastic bags suitable for sandwiches and some small red plastic swords used for maintaining said food. She looks about the room for her subject, Gibbs points to the Head door.

He then checks his watch. "I want to meet at the Crime Scene at midnight, all of us, Palmer, Benoit," he glances to McGee, "and your wife too."

There's no time to ask the purpose of this extended conference because the Head door opens and Michelle leads Meredith out. "You okay?" Gibbs asks.

"Yes." She meets each of their eyes in a fast pan. "I'm sorry–"

"Then–"

"but that was the _last_ question I'm answering. I _want_ that Lawyer."

Gibbs looks to Michelle, but in her frank expression he sees that she hadn't influenced this decision. She knows better than to make a difficult situation worse, and she's had Rule Number 13 drummed into her even more heavily than the others have. "All right," he says to Meredith and starts to lead the exodus again.

Ziva approaches her. "I need to collect samples from your fingernails."

"I _said_ –"

"I shall ask you no questions," she says, putting her bundle down on a dresser top, "I shall collect this evidence and leave." She will also take all her possessions and officially move upstairs, then pack and transfer Tate's from Coral 44.

"Why?"

It's Michelle who answers. "Meredith, you're accused of slitting her throat with a knife. You say you tried to rip her face off. You can do only one or the other, so if we find skin cells under your nails it's pretty hard to hold a knife."

"Palmer," is all Gibbs says. An Investigator should not give the image of showing favoritism.

"Fine," Tate says, extending her left hand.

"Meredith?"

"Tim, I really, really appreciate everything you did for me but I'm not going to answer your questions either."

"No question." He fishes about in his pockets. "I noticed you didn't eat any of that dinner." He pulls a packet of mints out, shrugs and admits "I know it's nothing, but you can order Room Service if you want." He tosses her the packet left handed toward her right side; she reaches across her body with her left hand and snatches it from the air.

"Guess I..." She shrugs, a helpless gesture. "Thank you."

x

At the signal to the guarding crewman whose sole duty is to make sure the woman receives what she needs but that she stays inside, the agents file out.

Gibbs leads his team down the passageway past two sets of cabin doors, then turns on McGee. "What was that about?"

"Boss, I noticed something about her yesterday, when I was reading her handwritten notes on the play. I didn't take much notice then, it didn't matter, but she's left handed."

"I got that, McGee."

"Well, when she got hit, she put her hand to her face and got blood all over it. If she did have a knife in her hand it would have to have been in her right hand, but she fell on her own place setting, so her utensils would have been reversed. A person's natural reaction would be to grab with the dominant hand as she just did. Yet if she was holding the knife with her already bloody hand, it would have been too slippery to get a good grip on it to slit Hannigan's throat.

"She also told me earlier she doesn't eat before a performance, even at a dinner theater. And though when she fell everything on the table got messed up, I looked at the table before they cleaned it; everything was a mess but she was having Fettuccine Alfredo." Most of that had wound up on her chest.

"So?" Tony counters.

Gibbs considers the man is lucky he's out of immediate reach. "When was the last time you were served pasta with a steak knife?"

"Well, my second Boarding School wasn't one of the - Shutting up now, boss."

x

It doesn't last. "But sorry, McCompass, I hate to burst your bubble - it was a good theory, but she had the blood on her right hand."

"No, Agent DiNozzo," Michelle counters, "it was her left."

She hands Gibbs her cell phone.

The image displayed is from the Crime Scene in the moments of confusion following the murder. Palmer had snapped several pictures and in the one she displays Tate is in the once white, now blood sprayed gown, her face smeared with blood, her right arm held by Gibbs.

The palm of her left hand is red.

"Okay, so I was wrong," Tony grants. "Carrie had the knife in her right hand."

"Where'd she get it?"

"From one of the other Players."

"The woman on her left," Tim says, "was eating Chicken Marsalia, the man on her right was having Rump Roast."

"Ah HAH."

"However his knife was still at his place."

"And the Captain says they don't even use that kind of knife," Gibbs says.

"They don't?" Michelle asks.

"Well," DiNozzo says with a 'you couldn't tell us that earlier?' look, "we only have the word of the Property Mistress that there's only one knife. Suppose she got an identical one on the sly."

"Special Agent Gibbs? I don't believe them," Michelle declares.

"Who?"

"The Bronnes. I didn't see a knife. Did any of us see a knife?" No one volunteers. "We were ten to twenty feet away with unobstructed views other than by Hannigan and the Bronnes saw one from over forty feet away between two other actors? I don't think so."

"For the moment, since we have too many knives on the floor, we'll assume she did."

"But–"

He's had enough. "Conference in twenty seven minutes."


	12. Life's Sweetest Reward

Chapter Twelve  
Life's Sweetest Reward

Tim McGee approaches Promenade Port Cabin 238 in the third quarter of the ship in time to see the door open and a very unexpected person step out. With the way the day has gone, he's in no mood for more surprises and this one is very unwelcome.

"Captain Stubing." He'd gotten the story from Abby through Gibbs about ten skeleton keys held by the Captain and Purser.

"Ah, good evening Agent McGee," the white over black uniformed man greets him amiably. But considering there's been a murder on his ship, McGee expects the tone is automatic professional. Actually, that's the _second_ thing on his mind.

"It's not evening, it's twenty two minutes to midnight and would you mind telling me why you're coming out of my cabin at this hour when my _wife's_ alone inside?"

The door behind the man opens. "Simple, a cuisle, he was inviting me to Church." Siobhan stands behind the Shipmaster, dressed in blue slacks and green tee shirt. "And your jealous voice is _very_ sexy."

x

Tim feels a multi car pileup on the highway of his mind. As if Shav would willingly–

Stubing's eyes go wide in distressed realization. "Oh, Agent McGee, I hope you don't think that I–" he glances back to the lovely redhead, "that _we_ ," then to the aggrieved husband, "were–"

"No. Yes," he admits, seeing no point in lying. He _trusts_ Siobhan, but a man with a pocketful of skeleton keys... He puts his hand to his face. "This has been a hell of a day."

"Tell me about it."

"Someone just tell me, in five words or less, what this is all about."

Siobhan smiles and returns what he'd given her at her same plea on Thursday at Saint Mary the Virgin: "I don't think I can say it in five words."

" _Shaaaav_."

"I came to speak to your wife. Even though the Pacific Princess doesn't usually host Religious Services other than the occasional Wedding, under the circumstances I felt some kind of a Memorial Service for Mrs. Hannigan would be appropriate, and your gracious wife has very kindly agreed to conduct one."

He looks to the redhead but says to Stubing "I'm sure she did." Appeal to Shav to conduct a Liturgy? On a Sunday? More likely they'd have to tie her up to prevent her.

She turns to the Shipmaster. "Please tell your crew and guests that we shall proceed as agreed."

"Ten thirty in the Excelsior Room. We'll have everything you need set up."

"Ten thirty, then. Oh. A favor you might do that'd truly help. If someone could go to the website we discussed, BCPonline dot Org, on the left side of the main page locate The Holy Eucharist, then select Rite One and print copies for as many people as you expect, that'd be tremendous."

He pulls a small pad and pen from his uniform pocket and makes the note. "I'll have it taken care of."

She looks to Tim. "I prefer Two, of course, but I think Jethro is going to find One more useful to him, especially pages 330 to 332."

"Uhhh," he has no idea what she's leading to, "you're right."

"And Captain, if I can get three volunteers to read the Old Testament, the Psalm and the Epistle, I'll print them out in the morning from the on-line Lectionary at the business office, that'll be quick."

"Everything will be ready for you then," Stubing says.

"Thank you, Captain. Good night."

"Good night, Mother. Agent."

"Good night."

x

He said the parting words to the Captain, but his eyes were hard on his wife's, and when he backs her into the room and shuts the door: "Shav, I don't even want to think about what Gibbs will say about this."

"None of his business," she says with hard finality.

He can virtually feel the head slap he hasn't earned but will receive by default - the fault that Gibbs will not express his outrage so to the Captain and certainly not to Shav. "The Players are going to insist upon coming."

"I expect so. This Service will primarily benefit those closest to the deceased," her tone hardens, "as if I ever had to _explain_ any of this to _you_."

"They're on lockdown, sequestered. One of them is a murderer."

"The Service includes a General Confession and Absolution - as you also know very well. In fact, that's why I specifically selected Rite One. The language is much stronger and will have more impact - particularly upon your suspects - so tell Jethro to watch closely for I _promise_ you that I shall _not_."

He's still not certain what she's talking about, can only focus upon "We're going to have to bring eight people together and keep them separate. The logistics-"

"Timmy, we-" She takes a deep breath, lets it out slowly. "Timmy, we settled a long time ago that there's Canon Law and there's Civil Law and there are NCIS Regulations and you always know exactly where I stand on the three. We agreed that where the conflict comes up outside of us we will agree to disagree and proceed from there as each of us has to. I _hope_ we are not going to have our very first fight, not over this."

x

"No. No, we're not going to fight, especially since we're both 100% right. But tell me this," he gives her blue slacks and green tee shirt elevator eyes, normally a most pleasurable trip but "what are you going to _wear_?"

He's sure he's flummoxed her, but she steps to her closet and opens the door. Hanging upon the inner side of it is her white alb, ten foot white cincture and green stole.

Going from flummoxer to flummoxee takes a few seconds to recover from. He still hasn't quite cleared all the debris from that multi-car pileup, let alone returned from the major detour she'd led him on with the book. "Where did you get those?" He's in no mood for stupid questions so "I mean what are you doing with them here?"

"Sweetness, do you think I would travel through a Sunday and not prepare? Actually, I had planned to speak to the Captain before this but everything that happened pushed it out of my mind. Good thing he came to me. Everything I'll need is in the Ship's Hold; it's being obtained as we speak."

"Good thing," he agrees, unable to dredge up much tone. "Wait!" He checks his watch. Fourteen minutes to midnight. "Come on, we have to hurry."

"What?"

"I was going to explain. I'll do it on the way. Hurry."

"What? Where?"

"The Crime Scene."

xxx

At Gibbs' direction his agents, plus Abby, Jimmy, Jeanne and Siobhan, return by 2400 to the pressed together tables from where they'd failed to watch the murder, having seen only the buildup and aftermath. The room remains closed to guests and crew, at what inconvenience Gibbs doesn't care.

At almost five hours since a spectacular murder took place, he will be surprised if many of the shipboard guests can sleep. He holds less hope for the crew.

By tacit agreement the Agents resume the seats they'd selected earlier. From Gibbs' position at the head of the combined tables where he faces the Crime Scene and recently cleaned blood, outward on his right are Abby, Ziva, Tim and Siobhan. From his left are Jimmy and Michelle, Tony and Jeanne. Beyond the open end are the blue roped off line of square tables for two and the six seater round table. Hannigan had been seated at the square table just to the right of their line to the round table.

Siobhan announces the upcoming Memorial Service in the Excelsior Room at ten thirty, scheduled between the breakfast and lunch seatings.

"You're kidding, right?" Tony asks.

"I never have 'kidded' about any Service, Anthony, most particularly a Memorial Liturgy. The Captain requested it and I said 'yes'. The Sanctuary is being set up on the lighted stage."

Her eyes dare DiNozzo to make an inappropriate joke about the gaudy setting; the lights that surround the stage call to mind an over-sized make up mirror, but he does not. In fact, she's often surprised by the felicity with which he can switch tracks, even on express trains running in opposite directions.

"Maybe that's not such a bad idea, boss. We can watch them for how they react during Hannigan's funeral."

This is a version of what she'd told her husband about pages 330 to 332. Now the man must know it's not a funeral but she won't come out and say what she'd told Timmy. Let him. "You do what you must, Anthony, but it will in no way have a bearing on the Liturgy."

"This will," Gibbs announces, his tone calling the meeting to order.

x

"All right," he declares from the table's head when he's sure - not that he ever doubted it - that he has everyone's attention, "the first thing is that we have no authority whatsoever to investigate this case."

This sparks the outraged response he'd expected, his Senior Field Agent's cutting through all the other voices. "Come on, Boss, we just came off five hours of–"

"This is an England Registered civilian vessel sailing between California and Mexico and not a single person involved is Navy or Marine. In fact, this murder took place after we crossed into Mexican territorial waters so England and Mexico have precedence. This is a matter for those two to decide." He casts a pointed look to his left, to Michelle, the team's Jurisprudence Specialist.

"Yes, sir, that's the way I see it too. We're out."

"Now hold on right there, lady!" DiNozzo barks to the woman at his right and for an instant it looks like Jimmy is going to object but Michelle grabs his forearm with both hands, which gives DiNozzo time to continue with "This murder happened twenty feet in front of us. As the only law–"

"American law," Michelle points out.

"on this entire ship, we're obligated. What are these cruise people going to do in Interviewing witnesses or Examining the Crime Scene or Autopsying the victim other than muck it up a hundred different ways?"

"This brings up something even more important than jurisdiction," Gibbs says.

"What's that?" Tony asks.

"You _forget_ we're all laid off, DiNozzo?" Gibbs demands with force that's been building up in him for five hours, waiting for someone to pop the cork. "We failed our Psych Exams. We're on this damned cruise to unwind for a week, go back and pass the damned things. Anyone who fails this next one is terminated."

"Wait a minute!" Siobhan exclaims. "What?" She grabs Tim's arm because he's not looking at her. She _makes_ him look. "You're laid off? You're going to be _fired_?"

"I'll pass. I didn't want you to worry."

Jeanne turns on Tony. "Let me guess: you didn't want _me_ to worry."

"No."

Siobhan's words are explosive, such Gaelic as not even her husband understands but Jeanne Benoit is in complete agreement.

x

"That brings us to where we are tonight," Gibbs says.

"And where are you?" Benoit demands.

"A week long cruise, rest and relaxation, no decisions harder than between shuffle board and taking a nap. No NCIS, no Murder, no Investigation, no Interrogations and we go back to DC rested and refreshed, pass our Evaluations and go back to our jobs and our lives."

"Or," DiNozzo counters, "we continue to work to solve a murder these very nice cruise people can't possibly handle, catch the murderer and maybe - just maybe - a fall girl doesn't rot in a Mexican prison while England, Mexico and the good old U. S. of A. debate jurisdiction and then 'guilty until proven innocent' vs. the reverse."

"And if that happens," Tim says, "I say that'll be a sin on me that Shav can't absolve." Siobhan glares at him but it's a fire born of fear.

"I included you two," Gibbs says to the women at the end of the table, "because this affects you even though it isn't your decision. It's on us."

Abby stands up. "The suspense is killing me. No more debate, we all know who we are and what we'll do. Time to say it. Those who want to Investigate this should do so. Those who don't want to, who want to take the unwind Jenny planned and a shot at passing, _no one will say a word against you_."

She sits down. "Who wants to continue?" She raises her hand.

Gibbs is also immediate. Ziva, Michelle, Tim and Tony raise their hands virtually simultaneously. Jimmy expects he's the last until Siobhan and Jeanne join the decision.

x

"All right, " Gibbs says, sounding very gratified. "Meeting over. DiNozzo, McGee, you and I will go up to Hannigan's cabin; search, bag and tag."

"Bag and tag, boss?"

"Improvise, DiNozzo. Get some of those clear laundry bags and a pad. Don't forget a marker. McGee, if Hannigan had a computer, get into it and find out everything you can."

"Tricky, Boss."

"Why?"

"Well, normally I clone a hard drive onto my system, put the original into Evidence and work on the cloned data. This way if anything happens we have the original safe."

"So? Do that here."

"Boss, that's not practical. At NCIS I have a ten terabyte dedicated drive. Here I have a 60 gig laptop that's more than three quarters full."

"You write too much. Copy the files you need or don't make any changes on hers."

Tim gives up. Not only doesn't the man understand the complexities of linked or hidden files but he's getting impatient, which means explanations are less and less welcome.

"Now, as to where we stand–"

"I think," DiNozzo says, "they want to know that too."

The others follow his gaze to where white and black uniformed Captain Merrill Stubing, Commander Adam Bricker and white dressed Barbara Copeland approach. They halt at the foot of the tables.

"Ladies, gentlemen," Stubing, flanked by his crew, says, "we're hoping you have some information for us."

"That's my cue, I think," Jimmy says, doing his best to divide his attention between Gibbs and Stubing at opposite ends of the tables. He knows enough to pretend to give a report that'll contain nothing the trio doesn't already know. "Doctor Bricker and Nurse Copeland and I did the autopsy in their Infirmary. I've done the External Examination on Mrs. Hannigan, photographed, documented the wound on a sketch pad and anatomy chart. One of the crew brought a tape recorder up from 'Unclaimed Property' so I have a report of my observations.

"Mrs. Hannigan's throat was cut, the cut was deep and damaged her esophagus, trachea and right carotid artery. The artery was sliced but not severed. We tried to stop the bleeding here," he points to the spot where the body had lain, "and when we lost her pulse Doctors Bricker and Benoit tried CPR while I applied pressure to the wound, particularly the artery. It didn't work. In less than a minute she bled to death."

x

The agents know his actual report will be much richer in detail but for now the three can believe they've been read in.

"Where are you now?" Stubing asks.

"Well, she's in a cleared out freezer until the morning and I'm..." He shrugs. "I'm right here."

"Do you have any _suspects_?"

"At this point," Gibbs says, "the Hannigan Players. I think we all know they're not getting out of their cabins or communicating with anyone until we work out who did it."

"What about the young lady who fought with her, Meredith Tate?"

"What about her?"

"Well, it looked to..."

"Skipper, NCIS doesn't conduct its Investigations based on what something looked like. We examine everything an–"

Michelle Palmer leaps to her feet with a long, massive gasp and her chair crashes behind her. Her hands are pressed low to her abdomen, her eyes and mouth wide with utter astonishment, her rapid gasps short and heavy.

x

As quickly as her husband and Doctors Benoit and Bricker converge on her Gibbs and DiNozzo give way but she apparently sees none of them. She stares forward, eyes wide, her panting gasps making her chest heave. She doesn't seem to be in pain but her breath is so fast, shallow and loud she can't say anything. Everyone is on their feet, but can do less than the three doctors.

" _Honey_?"

"Mrs. Palmer?" Bricker tries.

"Michelle?" Jeanne isn't heard either.

"Oh My God, 'Chelle! What'd I _do_? Did I hurt you?" He'd been so rough with her when they'd made love, tried to drive out his hurt in her body. She pants so wildly she can't answer, but by the way she holds her spread hands one above the other above her pelvis he had to have hurt her! He ruptured something and it's just now given way!

"Adam?" Stubing demands from the foot of the tables. Copeland can't approach the gasping woman past the three doctors. Tony and Gibbs move to the other side of the long table with Tim and the three women to give them more room to work. Siobhan crosses herself but can do nothing but whisper so low Tim can't distinguish her words as Bricker glances back to his boss.

"I haven't a clue, Merrill."

x

The only thing the crowding physicians can discern from the hyperventilating woman's expression is astonishment so vast as to be overwhelming.

"Barbara," Bricker commands his nurse at the foot of the table with Stubing, "run to Infirmary, bring back a gurney."

" _Goddess_!" the woman's speeding gasps resolve into a desperate whisper as Barbara Copeland, halted in place for an instant by this desperate call, runs for the door. " _Goddess_! GODDESS!"

"' _Chelle, what's WRONG_?" Jimmy's voice is flooded with panic as he tries to give her a thorough examination in seconds. " _Did I hurt you_?"

"Michelle?" Jeanne tries again but the gasping woman can't hear her and probably can't even see her through wide eyes that stare straight ahead.

"Mrs. Palmer, can you hear me? If you don't stop hyperventilating you're going to–" her eyes roll back and she falls, a dead weight in their arms. "Faint."

Bricker and Benoit relinquish the unconscious woman into her husband's grasp and he gently eases her to the carpet. "Chelle! 'Chelle! CAN YOU HEAR ME?"

Though she's no longer gasping her almost closed eyes, once wide in utter astonishment, flutter rapidly.

"' _ **CHELLE**_!"

xx

When the Doctors and Nurse wheel Michelle Palmer from the dining hall Gibbs has to verbally restrain his team. Predictably, Abby is the most determined to follow but "How many people can fit into that Infirmary?"

Stubing raises his own restraining hand to the men and women. "Those four people won't have enough room to work."

Sure enough, ten minutes later, Jeanne Benoit returns to the table. To the anxious Agents, led by Abby who would have run to intercept her if not for Gibbs, Jeanne gives what answers she has.

"She recovered consciousness on the way. She says she's all right and refuses treatment." She shares with her friends that "When she said that Jimmy's head almost exploded. Whatever's wrong, he's sure it's his fault. He kept saying he hurt her, but in the passageway we gave her a fast check and neither Doctor Bricker nor I could find anything wrong. It took more to calm him down than to take care of her; but she was calm, no distress."

This doesn't satisfy Gibbs. One of his agents fainted and his agents do not faint. "What happened to her?"

Benoit hates to say it but "I don't know."

xx

The Infirmary, which on a cruise ship that rarely sees distress serious enough not to be treated in a cabin or on a deck, is nothing more than a Waiting Room and Examination Room / Office where Adam Bricker and Barbara Copeland try to work on their patient around her frantic husband. Normally Bricker would send a husband into the Waiting Room but Palmer's an M.D. and likely to have answers, even if from questioning their patient.

That it devolves into a near interrogation isn't surprising, but everything Bricker has been able to do comes down to one conclusion:

"I'm telling you I feel fine," Michelle mumbles around the short digital thermometer, arm still in a pressure cuff since neither Bricker nor Copeland can get close enough to free her.

"Do you know what _happened?"_

"Yes, darling, I know exactly what happened," she tries to enunciate.

" _WHAT_?" She gives him a significant downward look and he takes the instrument from her mouth, inspects it. "You're high."

"How high," the ship's CMO must ask, impatient to get to his patient.

"98.6 _7._ "

Bricker reclaims the device with a 'Don't make me sedate you' look as Copeland gets close enough to unwrap the cuff.

x

Michelle waits until it's withdrawn. "Doctor, thank you for everything, you too nurse, but honestly I'm fine."

"Well," Bricker says, "you seem fine. You're lucid, don't seem to be in distress though you used up your allotment of that before you fainted. But your temperature and pressure are good and you don't seem to be in pain." She shakes her head. "Truth is, if you want to leave I can't hold you - but please do come back if anything else happens."

"Well, I really don't think this'll ever happen again, but I promise."

Jimmy has been holding the explosion back ever since he'd discovered her fever. "HOW DO YOU _KNOW_?"

"Jimmy, sweetheart?"

" _WHAT_?"

She hadn't thought that he could hit High E. "Say 'goodnight' to the nice doctor and nurse and let's go."

xx

They get thirty feet down the passageway when Jimmy rushes in front of her. "'Chelle, what _happened_ to you? Did I _hurt_ you?"

"Not here. I don't know where but I don't want it to be here." She hugs him. "Let's go dancing."

" _Dancing_? It's after 0100!"

"Then let's eat. I barely ate at the play and that was hours ago. I'm Starved."

"'CHELLE!"

She releases him. "I guess we really don't get to decide where any more than we do when. The truth is it was such a surprise. Shock, rather. No," she considers, "more like–"

"' _CHELLE_!"

"The touch of the Goddess."

" _TOUCH_? More like she punched you in the stomach."

"Noooo, not the stomach."

"Chelle, if you don't tell me what you're _talking_ about–!"

"I'm trying, but you're not making it easy."

" _I'M NOT MAKING IT–?_ "

She places her hands upon his chest, feels his racing heart. "Honey, I mean it. I felt the touch of the Goddess. Or God, I won't quibble, not this time." She smiles up at him more joyously than she's felt in weeks. "It was a new soul."

"A new _soul_?"

"I felt it arrive. That's what surprised me so." She looks up into his wide and panicked eyes. "You really, truly don't get it, do you?"

"GET _WHAT_?"

She hooks her finger behind his first closed shirt button, pulls him down and kisses him, extends the kiss for half a minute until she can feel it overwhelm panic. She lets him come up a few inches and whispers very softly: "I'm pregnant."

x

Jimmy stops, still partially bent to her.

He says nothing.

"Jimmy?" He doesn't move, doesn't straighten up. Even his eyes aren't doing those tiny flickers. "Honey?" He's not breathing. " _Honey_?"

She's seen her boss do it many, many times - never again to her after more than a year ago - but she reaches up behind his head and slaps sharply.

" _Pregnant_ OhMyGodPregnantYou'repregnantOhmyGodhowcanyoube–!"

"JIMMY!" He'd risen to hysterical.

"HOWcanyoube _PREGNANT_?" is two octaves too high.

She considers carefully, tries to slow him down by drawing it out. "Welllll, let's see now." She ticks the points off on slim fingers. "We went up for the Play and dinner. Before that we dressed in our finery. Before that we took a shower together." She smiles up to him. "Because before _that_ weeee..."

She screams when he yanks her up from the floor, chest to chest and she's spinning wildly about in the passageway to their ecstatic laughter.

They'd only gone thirty feet from the Sick Bay so it was her scream that pulls Adam Bricker and Barbara Copeland into the passageway. When Jimmy sees them he stops spinning, Michelle still clutched a foot off the floor so her feet swing like a bell clapper.

"I'm pregnant! I mean _she's_ pregnant, I'm going to have a baby - I mean _we're_ going to have a baby!"

"Congratulations."


	13. And Are Heartily Sorry

Chapter Thirteen  
And Are Heartily Sorry

Tim McGee, having slept the sleep of the exhausted aided by the comforting rocking of the ship, finishes dressing at five minutes to seven when he hears the blow dryer in the Head (he tries not to consider the pun) turn off and a moment later the door opens. Siobhan wears her green robe and her red hair glows in the light, again reminding him of fire, unusual because she's more cautiously anticipatory rather than annoyed. The hair / mood thing doesn't often work, he admits, and this time it's definitely missed its mark.

"Are you ready for this?" he asks.

"Yes. The Service is nothing new, of course. I can do it blindfolded."

"You have." She'd had such good reason for the experiment.

"I'm going to go down," she glances to the overhead, "or up–"

"It's on this deck."

"To see the room. I don't like doing a Liturgy in a strange place without at least seeing it."

"We can have breakfast there," he says an instant before the telephone rings. "Or not."

"What would he do if we were...?"

"He might give us another thirty seconds, but I'd hear about it later."

"There should be one of his rules about that."

"I wouldn't want to memorize it." The telephone is still ringing and it's right next to her. "Are you going to get that?"

"It's Sunday. It's a day of rest."

"Since when has Sunday not been your busiest day?" he asks. Actually the Sabbath is her 'day off', Sunday never. Seeing she doesn't intend to move he walks to the night table beside her, but she snatches up the receiver an instant before he's close enough.

"Jethro, your timing is as horrific as ev- Oh, Captain Stubing, I'm so _sorry."_ She blushes redder than her hair. "No, you didn't disturb anything. My husband and I were going to look at the Excelsior Room over breakfast." She pulls the belt of her robe open, shrugs out of the garment and tosses it to the bed. "Yes, thank you. We shall see you there. Goodbye." She puts the receiver down and collapses within her body. "Oh, my God. Timmy, if I ever do something like that again, slap me."

"Count on it," he says, never intending to do any such thing.

"Well, let's get out of here before the phone rings _again_." Her quick walk to the door is halted by

"Skyclad?"

The word means something. She's heard Michelle use it. It means– She looks down at herself. " _Ohargh_!"

xxx

Gibbs knocks on the door to Lido 57, one section fore of his own and of Ziva's former cabin where Meredith Tate has been sequestered under guard. But when the door is opened it's by a man wearing blue boxers and probably more tattoos than Abby has. "Yes?"

He glances at the door again. Yes, it's L057. "I'm looking for Abby Sciuto."

The smile the man gives him is very ill advised. "She's kinda busy. And you are?"

" _Her BOSS._ "

The door flies fully open - "Ooops!" It closes far enough to show her head and one bare shoulder and the most unkempt hair he's ever seen on her head. He turns away, stares down the passageway. "Gibbs, we - I wasn't expecting you."

Obviously. He keeps his eyes locked on a distant point beyond L001. "You've only been away from that meeting for six hours."

"Six hours is a quarter of a day, Gibbs. A lot can happen in a quarter of a day."

He starts to turn back, but a bare shoulder implies bare too much more. "Meet me in McGee's cabin in half an hour. Promenade 238. You can have some breakfast before we get started."

Oh, I've already eaten." Her smile when he dares to look back makes him very determined not to know.

"Half an hour," he says, walking away. "And bring a comb."

He pulls out his phone as the door clicks shut. He mustn't forget to tell McGee that he's hosting this morning's Briefing.

xxx

"ATTENTION PASSENGERS," Captain Stubing's voice blasts out from loudspeakers throughout the ship and more quietly from the intercoms in each guest's cabin. "We have rounded Baja California Sur and will soon dock in Mazatlán. Mazatlán is a Nahuatl word meaning 'place of deer'. Founded in 1531 by an army of Spaniards and indigenous settlers, it is the second-largest city in the state. It is also a popular tourist destination, with beaches lined with resort hotels. For those going ashore after breakfast there are numerous amenities that await you. Brochures covering many popular tourist locations are available in the Purser's Lobby on the Promenade Deck." There's a pause for the shifting of gears.

"It is my sad duty at this time to also announce the death last evening of one of our passengers, Mrs. Dale Hannigan, late of the Hannigan Players, who performed last evening in the Riviera Lounge.

"There is a Religious Service scheduled this morning in the Excelsior Room on the Promenade Deck at ten thirty. All who wish to attend are invited to do so."

xx

There was no point, Tim decided, in raising an objection to Gibbs' selection of his cabin to host the morning briefing / brainstorming session. Within the team there are only two double cabins and until there's a suitable explanation for last night's very dramatic conclusion to the last session, no one feels comfortable moving in on the Palmers on the Aloha deck.

He'd intended a nice breakfast with his wife in the Excelsior Room, afterwards she would familiarize herself with the room and her equipment; 'block the scene' as she put it, then go to the Business Office to download and print today's Readings for the volunteers Stubing will select.

The call had come in as they were sitting down to the buffet breakfast, which he had to rush through. Siobhan had sent him back with a suggestion that he order Room Service, very likely for everyone, knowing Jethro's pace. She would stay to complete her preparations, then join him.

x

When he left she'd finished her own breakfast but the flavor had departed with her husband. Thinking more about what's going on back in their cabin, she's inattentive when she stands up, turns and nearly collides with Vicki Stubing.

"Good morning," the blue and white uniformed woman greets her with professional enthusiasm. Siobhan restrains herself from pointing out that, with a murder only twelve hours ago and a murderer still unidentified, terrible for an event that happened in front of five Investigators and more than a hundred witnesses, there is little good that can be said about this morning. Instead she returns the greeting.

"Dad got tied up on one of his five hundred morning duties," the tall woman says with a companionable smile, "so he asked me to help you out, see that everything was ready."

"Thank you." She looks to the roped off black stage which she'd already inspected from across the room. Over the years she's grown very adept in determining at a glance if everything needed for a proper Liturgy was on hand and ready for use. Now as they approach the stage, she still dislikes the squared arch of bulbs that make it look less like a Church's Sanctuary than a dressing room's make-up table. Nonetheless, she grants that the plethora of bulbs will provide her with plenty of light.

"If someone might move the table back?" She indicates a spot two thirds forward from the back wall. "I'll be in front of it for the Liturgy of the Word, behind it for the Liturgy of the Sacrament." The woman might as well know the proper names.

"I'll take care of it," she says, making a note on her smart phone.

On the small table to her right are the two chalices she'll need, the other equipment set around it. Set up is easy, she can do it blindfolded and had long ago prepared for worse.

"I wasn't sure what color vestments they should bring up, so I figured better to check with you."

She'd been prepared to use only her alb, cincture and stole. "This is Ordinary time but also a Memorial Service, so white if you have it, green if you do not."

"Oh, we have all colors, because we never know who'll be doing what. Red, white, green, blue, pink–"

"Rose."

"I'm sorry?"

She pulls her attention back from the table to the woman, annoyed with herself for letting it drift. "I'm sorry, that was automatic. Rose vestments are worn on Gaudete Sunday, the third Sunday of Advent and Laetare Sunday, the fourth in Lent."

"See, I've learned something."

"Yes." She removes the clear stoppers from the three crystal cruets and points out each to Vicki. "I'll need wine in this one and water each of these, only half full."

"Right." That too goes into her phone.

x

Beside the silver lavabo bowl there's a box of round wafers, including the large one that will be the Priest's Host.

Not quickly but with the smoothness of long experience she funnels the contents of the box into one of the golden chalices. She has no idea how many to prepare so she'll consecrate all of them. Then she drapes the folded purificator over the golden chalice, places the gold paten upon that cloth, on which disk she centers the Priest's Host and covers all with the hard square linen covered pall, followed by the green veil. She folds the large linen corporal and puts it inside the matching green burse, sets them atop the prepared chalice.

"I should come down with you," she says, indicating the green veil and burse, "since if my chasuble and stole are white these should be as well, so we'll choose as needed and available." She looks out at the breakfasting guests, too aware that she has to go to her second job after she prints out the Readings. She turns back to Vicki.

"I'm sorry, I should have done better."

"Nonsense. You did just fine. Where should I prepare?"

"Your can use the Performers' Dressing Room." She points to a black door flush with the black wall at stage left.

"Not bad. I never spotted it. Thank you, Vicki."

"No problem."

"When we're done in the Hold and finish up here I have to go to my 'other' job, but I'll be back by ten."

"Everything will be ready for you. The back door opens to the port passageway. You can use that way in and out of your sanctuary."

Siobhan won't mention it'll be the Sacristy, that they're standing in the makeshift Sanctuary. At nineteen Vicki is as young a she was when she'd been led by the Holy Spirit to Brooklyn some fifteen years ago and first heard the names of the things she uses so easily today. In fact, she sees quite a few reflections of that young woman in the woman before her.

"Vicki, you've been an excellent help, and I thank you most sincerely. Now, if we might go to your Hold I'll make the final selections, then I have to rush to the Business Office."

"Right this way," she says, heading for the camouflaged door.

xxx

By the time Siobhan consulted an on-line Lectionary and printed the day's Readings, then gave them to a crewwoman for delivery to the Captain and returned to Port Promenade 238, two sections back on the same deck as the Lounge now Chapel, the cabin suited for two is overfull with eight people, now nine. The space that remains is taken up by three Room Service carts upon which stand as wide a variety of breakfast selections as one could reasonably hope for.

There's room beyond the rolling tables for her to stand, so that's her third destination. Kissing Timmy and checking the vestments hanging on the closet's inner door are, as always, first and second.

"The cut was a straight one," Jimmy continues his report. "While the cut was not as efficient as a curved and deep cut that gets both common carotid arteries, it did damage the external right artery. Nick or sever one, she could bleed out without medical care but there was a chance she might have survived with Doctors Bricker, Benoit," he nods to the woman, "and I working together."

No one answers this point. 'Might have' doesn't fit in an Investigation.

x

"Actually the cut changed direction, it went across but then there was a definite change of about sixty degrees to slice the artery.

"In this case the external artery, which carries blood to the head and face - the internal artery supplies the brain - was sliced but not severed. It's hard to do all this with a straight line cut but our murderer did it. He or she also damaged the trachea and esophagus. That took a lot of force. Then when Mr. Finch grabbed her he didn't help. In fact, his panic may have sped her death. I don't have the means to do a proper autopsy here so I can't say for certain if the other Doctors and I _could_ have saved her, but those seconds we lost and the body being moved, it was just too much."

"Could that change in direction be done from front _or_ from the back?" Gibbs asks.

"By someone who knew what he or she was doing, definitely."

"What was the direction of the cut?"

"Hannigan's left to her right, a horizontal slash across but deep into the throat two inches above her clavicle. The blade was canted upward and it took a lot of force but that could be explained by her charge."

"Wait," Siobhan says, "I know I missed a lot, but last night Timmy said you eliminated Meredith Tate as a suspect." No one answers, so she turns to her silent husband. "Didn't you?"

"No one's been eliminated," Gibbs declares.

DiNozzo's take on it is "Guilty until proven innocent," which earns him a sharp reprimand. "Thank you, boss."

"We eliminate a suspect," Tim tells her, "when we either identify the real one or prove it's impossible for someone to do it."

She looks to Gibbs. "Would that be 31A?"

He considers it. "Works for me."

x

"What about her story?" Gibbs asks Jimmy Palmer. "She said she tried to rip Hannigan's face off."

"I went back for a closer look at the body. There are five scratches under her hairline, three on her right side, two on her left."

"Abby, Ziva gave you scrapings from under Tate's fingernails."

"I did find what might be skin in three of the bags from her left hand and two from her right."

Sounds good so far but he can't wrap a point up with 'good so far'. "Is it Hannigan's skin?"

x

x

x

" _Well_?"

"Gibbs, do you _see_ any of my equipment here?"

"Doctor Bricker has a microscope."

"Thank you, Jimmy, he already loaned it to me. But the best I could tell you here is that she had skin cells under her nails." She won't point out, as it will do no good to speculate and it's much too late now, that the girl had been allowed to shower before they knew about the nails. The cells might or might not be from Hannigan. It's impossible to guess with what little was left.

"Good."

"Gibbs, _everyone in this room_ has skin cells under their nails if they scratched an itch since their last manicure."

"Okay," he knew they were working against their own shortages but "what about the knife? If we can't narrow down what her hands were doing, could she hold the knife?"

x

Ziva says "Bronne said the knife was in her left hand - by the way, I do not believe them; none of us saw a knife and no one else reported it, but if she had it it would be a right to left cut for her, left to right for Hannigan, and Tate is left handed."

"But when she was punched," McGee says, "she felt her face with her left hand, just as a left handed person would."

"You ought to know," Tony observes.

"Right, Tony, I would and I did. She used her left hand on her face and got blood all over it. We settled that last night."

"The knife was covered in blood," Gibbs declares.

"And if she tried to use the force it would take to make that deep a long and redirected cut," Tim says, "the knife would slip from her small hand."

"Abs, can you tell whether the blood on the handle is Tate's?"

"Sure-"

"Good. Get started–"

"- the minute I get back to my lab."

x

He's halted. He doesn't like to be halted when he's on the starting line, it's like having the rug pulled out from under him. Again. First skin, now blood. What's the next thing they can't do on a vacation cruise? "What?"

"Gibbs, typing blood isn't like making bathtub gin. Everything I need is 3,000 miles away."

"Can't you do some presumptive test?" Tony asks.

"I think we're all pretty much agreed that it's blood," she says, frustration heavy in her tone. "But I can't confirm type."

"It would not help," Ziva says. "I noticed when going through Meredith Tate's IDs a Blood Donor card indicating she is Type O+."

"And that's the most common type," Abby declares. "47 percent of Caucasians."

"Then I have bad news for you," Jimmy says.

Gibbs doesn't want more. "You gonna tell us that Hannigan is O+?"

"O–. So says her 'Medic Alert' bracelet."

He turns back to Abby. "And you can't tell positive from negative?

"Where? In the Galley?" He glares at her, it doesn't divert her. "Without going to a Mexican Lab and saying 'we know we're out of our jurisdiction, but would you mind running these tests for us?'-"

"Forget it."

"There's nothing I can do here."

"How many people are O's?"

"Four of us in this room are O's. That's what I mean by 'most common'. But we're at three positives and one negative. Plus, I don't think she did it either," Abby declares.

"Why?" He'll forgive her tangent if it's a good one.

x

"Well, look, Tate is short." She glances at Michelle, who _still_ hasn't answered her thrice repeated question about whatever happened last night. "Sorry, I mean petite, but she's even an inch petiter than Sammy."

"Petiter?"

She ignores Tony's challenge. "Hannigan's a full head taller."

"Which is why the cut was at an upward forward slash angle," Tony reminds her. "Points right back to her."

"No, it doesn't."

"What?" She doesn't often deny the obvious, but when she does, most of the time it's the obvious that's wrong.

"Bear with me. Now I'm five ten, just none of you know it because I won't let myself be caught dead at work without my boots, or in this case these superbly sexy Christian Louboutins." The black with blood red soles visible before the tall heels at least complement her black dress with the red trim, while the leather bows behind open toes make hints no one wants to explore. "Michelle, take off your shoes."

They can see she wants to ask, but she steps back out of her own high heeled shoes. At five five in her bare feet she's now considerably below Abby's enhanced height. She catches Jimmy's eyes and answers the offer she reads in them with a quick shake of her head. If she allowed her husband to follow his natural inclinations, she would have more pairs of sexy shoes than Imelda Marcos.

"Now," Abby takes a used knife from the cart, wipes it off and holds it handle forward to her, "Michelle, slit my throat."

" _Huh_?"

"Tony, get this picture."

"This should be a classic," Tony says, pulling out his cell phone as Michelle fingers the knife with great repugnance.

"Left handed, honey," Jimmy says.

"Oh, yeah." She switches the weapon.

When Tony is ready "Come on, Probette."

"Okay, okay," she pulls in a deep breath. "Don't rush me, okay?"

x

A few seconds later "This morning might be nice."

"Okay, okay." She turns to Abby, takes another deep breath and screams as she charges. "You _FUCKNG_ _**BITCH**_!"

The blade flashes to her throat, halts at a touch and Abby's hard pressed to restrain a scream of her own.

"Whoa! Method Acting. Not so fun from this side."

"I got the shot," Tony says. "This is going up in my cubicle." For someone enamored of death, the Goth Scientist has proven she has a healthy fear of it.

"Okay," Abby says as she takes the knife from Michelle, "now y–" she stops, takes her hand, looks closely into her brown eyes. "You're shaking."

She pulls her hands behind her back. "Am not." She can't escape, however. "Method Acting takes adrenaline." Still they stare. "Well, that's what my Coach says."

"Later," Gibbs orders. "Abs?"

x

"Oh, yeah," she comes back to the room with a 'later for you' look to her friend who resumes her shoes. First the most dramatic moment of last night, second only to the murder, now Acting lessons. There's still too much about the Lawyer / Agent / Witch that's secret.

She steps out of her Louboutins, turns her back to Tim and hands the knife up over her right shoulder. The cut must be their left to right. "Now you slit my throat. Stand by, Siobhan, if _he_ loses control too. I may need Last Rites by the time this demonstration's over."

"Not a chance, Abs," McGee assures her, readying the knife near her neck.

"You know, since Siobhan and I are the same height, he should use her while I watch."

"Right, like I'd hold a knife to Shav's throat."

"Ní Tá scian an arm úsáideann sé ar dom, Abby."

Tim's laugh is so hard he must grasp Abby's shoulder for support and almost drops the knife.

"What did she say?" Michelle asks.

He has to force down the laughter enough to get the words out. "You're too young to know."

"Well what about me? She said it to me."

"Sorry," he says, still fighting the hilarity.

But Ziva says to her partner "Dāo shì bùshì tā yòng zài wǒ shēnshang de wǔqì, Abby."

Michelle looks to the Priest, even more greatly astounded, and then all three women fall into a giggling huddle.

"COME ON!" Abby cries, which only makes the women laugh harder.

"I'll tell you when we get back to DC," Michelle promises when she can force a serious expression.

"No, you won't," Siobhan assures her.

"No, I won't," she solemnly tells her friend.

"Can we get on with this please," Tony says, "before we dock and turn Tate over to the Federales?"

x

This is enough to remove all the humor. Abby turns her back to Tim, he slowly draws the blade in a straight line across her throat. "Stop." she says.

Tony holds his cell phone up beside the knife and they can see it's "Not the same angle, guys." Michelle's upward angle is sharper; Tim's is a little tilt.

"That's about the angle on Hannigan's throat," Jimmy declares, pointing to Tim's cut.

"So we may be looking for a taller right handed assailant from the back, and the blood sprayed on Tate anyway," Gibbs says.

"A taller assailant from behind," Tony concludes, "accounts for King, Finch, McCabe, Simmons and Stern."

Gibbs always looks for trends in his Investigations and this is the second time Ann Stern has made the short list.

xxx

Gibbs wants to proceed with the interviews of the cast right away, but the Captain and Chaplain have together thrown up a delay that requires him to have each of the surviving members of the Hannigan Players escorted singly from their cabins on the Coral deck to the Promenade deck by his team. He must assign them to different places in the room, using an utterly arbitrary selection that, if it makes them uncomfortable, he's quite content. He can't deny them their presence and participation if they want it - and they all do - and this Service was set up expressly for their benefit, but Rule Number One will be scrupulously enforced.

The four men and four women are spread as far apart as he can have them by everyone from Abby to Ziva, only the woman who got him into this excluded, for obvious reasons.

While he certainly has the utmost respect for the Liturgy, even a not-Roman Catholic one, and does admit to its value today, it's extremely inconvenient when they're supposed to be working. And McGee's message to watch the suspects when they get to page 330 on the Xeroxed sheets (because his wife won't) doesn't help his mood.

He's chosen to guard Michael Simmons, who had been at the twelve o'clock position at the round table and therefore the least likely to have accomplished the murder and then get further away than the table the Palmer's pictures in the few seconds of dark and confusion said murderer was accorded. He wishes he could say it was impossible but he can't. Thus far no one can be eliminated.

He places him in the portion of the room that he does because it also affords him the opportunity to watch the other seven Players.

The room is filled with scores of guests, most of whom would normally attend Sunday morning Worship in their home parishes, to such an extent that there is soon no more available seating and latecomers must stand along the side walls on the upper level or find what vantage points they may which do not block views.

He suspects that many of those here came this morning because this Service memorializes a murder victim whom they had seen killed.

Several familiar uniformed people are in attendance, most notably the Captain and his daughter and Cruise Director McCoy in the forward row of chairs, starboard side. Dr. Bricker and his nurse Barbara Copeland, Purser Smith and Bartender Washington are scattered on the port side as seats were available.

At zero minute - at least they need not contend with delay for he's heard that McGee's wife is a stickler for punctuality - the camouflaged black door at stage left opens and the priest, dressed in white vestments, steps out and stands in the middle before the white covered table, now Altar, where she looks out at the crowded room.

He knows she'll go behind the table for the second part of the Liturgy.

x

"Good morning." Her amplified words are carried through the large room by a tiny microphone, the tip of which he can see in the collar of her chasuble. "Today's Liturgy is reprinted in your booklets and is said for the repose of the soul of Mrs. Dale Hannigan. At Communion, all Baptized Christians are invited to participate. Blessed be God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit."

Everyone responds, either reading the distributed pages or from familiarity "And blessed be His kingdom, now and forever. Amen."

x

Gibbs tries, as respectfully as he can, to divide his attention between the Service and eight faces in the crowded room as the woman before the white draped table continues, her brogue particularly mellow, something he's noticed frequently when she does her work:

"Almighty God, unto whom all hearts are open, all desires known, and from whom no secrets are hid: Cleanse the thoughts of our hearts by the inspiration of thy Holy Spirit, that we may perfectly love thee, and worthily magnify thy holy Name; through Christ our Lord."

"Amen," is a broken chorus.

"Hear what our Lord Jesus Christ saith: Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.

"Holy God, Holy and Mighty, Holy Immortal One,"  
"Have mercy upon us."

x

The Service continues through the Gloria, the Collect and the three Readings done by Adam Bricker and two other members of the crew, the Gospel, a brief Sermon which focuses on the life and death of Dale Hannigan, the Creed and the Prayers of the People.

Gibbs, focusing on eight faces, has also focused on the priest's and he must grant that he's impressed. He's attended few of her Services other than those specifically done in her role as Chaplain, such as the too many Memorials this year for fallen Agents and not once, even during her presentation of the Gospel, has she glanced at any paper.

x

Then comes the moment the Agents have been awaiting. Siobhan, eyes closed as she stands before the Altar, says "Ye who do truly and earnestly repent you of your sins, and are in love and charity with your neighbors, and intend to lead a new life, following the commandments of God, and walking from henceforth in His holy ways: Draw near with faith, and make your humble confession to Almighty God, devoutly kneeling."

There is little space for kneeling other than for those lining the walls. Most people elect to stand.

Eyes still closed, she leads them in the Confession as the agents watch their charges intently, scores of voices saying as one: "Almighty God, Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, maker of all things, judge of all men: We acknowledge and bewail our manifold sins and wickedness, which we from time to time most grievously have committed, by thought, word, and deed, against thy divine Majesty, provoking most justly thy wrath and indignation against us. We do earnestly repent, and are heartily sorry for these our misdoings; the remembrance of them is grievous unto us, the burden of them is intolerable. Have mercy upon us, have mercy upon us, most merciful Father; for thy Son our Lord Jesus Christ's sake, forgive us all that is past; and grant that we may ever hereafter serve and please thee in newness of life, to the honor and glory of thy Name; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen."

Still looking at no one, though Gibbs and his agents continue to inspect their charges, she raises her hand.

"Almighty God, our heavenly Father, who of his great mercy hath promised forgiveness of sins to all those who with hearty repentance and true faith turn unto Him, have mercy upon you, pardon and deliver you from all your sins, confirm and strengthen you in all goodness, and bring you to everlasting life; through Jesus Christ our Lord."

"Amen."

x

The Peace and Great Thanksgiving continue to the end of the Liturgy with, at the end, Siobhan leading the unified voices.

"Almighty and everliving God, we most heartily thank thee for that thou dost feed us, in these holy mysteries, with the spiritual food of the most precious Body of thy Son our Savior Jesus Christ; and dost assure us thereby of thy favor and goodness towards us; and that we are very members incorporate in the mystical body of thy Son, the blessed company of all faithful people; and are also heirs, through hope, of thy everlasting kingdom. And we humbly beseech thee, O heavenly Father, so to assist us with thy grace, that we may continue in that holy fellowship, and do all such good works as thou hast prepared for us to walk in; through Jesus Christ our Lord, to whom with Thee and the Holy Spirit, be all honor and glory, world without end.

"Amen," is a chorus.

She raises her hand in final Blessing.

"The peace of God, which passeth all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in the knowledge and love of God, and of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord." She slowly inscribes the Sign. "And the blessing of God Almighty, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, be amongst you, and remain with you always."  
"Amen."

xxx

The Agents, with Jeanne Benoit's assistance, have escorted the eight performers at staggered times and by different routes, to the Coral 46 to 58 range and to Lido 123 where they are again secured. Ziva, arriving first and securing her charge, waits outside cabin 44 - into which she had moved last night - until the other agents arrive.

Then, leaving the prisoners in the care of a crewman whose sole order is to prohibit their exits, the agents confer in Cabin 44.

"What've you got?" Gibbs asks as soon as the door is closed. They had been very attentive to their charges during the Confession and Absolution, and now have only to confirm who gave him or herself away.

*#*#*#*#*#*

Author's Note: What Siobhan so surprisingly told Abby, much to her frustration, was "A knife is not the weapon he uses on me, Abby."


	14. Reviews

Chapter Fourteen  
Reviews

In Coral 44, Tate's former cabin into which Ziva has moved, when the expanded team has secured their charges in their guarded cabins, Gibbs turns his attention to the former Mossad Officer. "David, you and Palmer bring Paulsen to DiNozzo's cabin, then you two use Benoit's for Observation."

"Thank you," Jeanne says at the Team Leader's generosity.

"Go out on deck," he advises. "It's a nice day."

"Thank you, no. I'll go into Mazatlán." She looks up to Tony. "Call me if you want to _join_ me." She wastes no time getting the head start she hadn't wanted when they'd made their Friday plans.

Tony says nothing for, in such a situation as this, nothing is the best thing to say. He can only hope this case can be wrapped up before Wednesday.

xx

When Judy Paulsen is escorted into Fiesta 105 and the women leave by the front door to enter cabin 109 where they can monitor through the ajar connecting door, the first thing on her mind is "I keep telling you 'I didn't do it'."

That's been the consensus since last night, though each of the Players has applied it to him- or herself.

"Have a seat."

There's little to avail herself of except the chair placed against the foot of the bed, no comfortable mattress as he'd allowed Tate. Gibbs places the other chair opposite her and DiNozzo and McGee take places at either side of the head of the bed, paired vultures unseen but very present, looming over the woman.

"Tell me about the Hannigan Players. How long have you been with them?"

"All five years, since we started. Only Ann and Pete were longer than me."

"Ann Stern and Peter Finch."

"Right. They were in it from Day 1. I was brought in within the first month."

"You like it?"

"What's not to like?" Paulsen asks. "I get paid to travel all over the country and perform original plays which we write ourselves. That's one of the rules, everyone has to contribute to the portfolio. I've written three."

"Murder mysteries?"

"Oh, no. Don't get the wrong idea about us. Two of mine were love stories, the other was a comedy. This, in fact, was the first murd–" She's battered hard, has to clamp her hand over her mouth to hold in the pain.

x

"Sorry," she manages to force out after half a minute, but keeps the clamp in place.

"It's okay. Murder is very emotional." She nods, but there's weakness in it. "What happened yesterday?"

She forces herself to lower her hand, but bitter pain remains. "We were _supposed_ to put on Merry's Master's Piece. She dropped it off Friday night, really late. She'd had Writer's Block for weeks, but rather than being annoyed at the last minute change I was relieved."

"Why?"

"I was dreading doing it as it'd been written. That first draft was a mess, but the one we were doing was pretty good. Frankly I was amazed; it was like she'd met her Muse and had sex with it."

Tony casts a grin to Tim, but the writer puts up a wall to shut him out.

x

"So you had a new script," Gibbs prompts, ignoring the byplay behind the woman.

"I spent every minute late Friday night and all yesterday studying it, because I'd been cast as the murderer and had to build someone who was trying to fake that she didn't have a Russian accent. It's hard suppressing an accent that you don't have."

"So, what about the lights? Probably made it hard too."

"Very. But in theater like this you have to go with what you have. We wind up in all sorts of settings. I like a stage, but I'm told the ship only has the one Dale's Service was on, and that was way too small. But Merry set us in the midst, so in the midst we were."

"What was with the lights?" He dislikes asking a question twice and feels he's been doing more of it in this cruise than in the last dozen cases.

"That I didn't care for, but like I said, you have to go with what you have. I had to go, in pitch blackness, do the murder and get back to my seat. It should've gone off, even without Night Vision, but it didn't."

"Night vision?"

"We all have these goggles, they let us get on and off when the House Lights are off."

"So, what's the problem?"

"I couldn't bring mine," she says. "Couldn't use them."

"You were the 'murderer'," DiNozzo challenges from behind her, obliging Paulson to turn right, "had to get from your spot to Hannigan's and back, and you didn't use them?"

His interruption was calculated to throw Judy off by having her have to deal with an unexpected adversary from another direction.

"I had no place to put those whopping big things. I'm sure you have ones worthy of James Bond, but the ones we have are from real life and probably came from the Connery days. What was I going to do, stick them in my _bra_?"

She can have no idea what she's getting into by introducing film allusions to DiNozzo, but he keeps his focus. "Leave them right on the table, hide them under a napkin. No one else could see your table."

That's not quite true, the people on the surrounding upper platform, such as the Bronnes, could but he has no intention of helping her.

"I memorized where everything was. I was the only one who was supposed to be up. Actually, it'd have been simpler for Dale to cut her own throat and put the knife under the table; that's how I'd've done it had I been the Duchess, but the way those two are I doubt Merry trusted her."

x

"What about the fake knife?" Gibbs pulls her forward again, a re-distraction.

"That I had. When we packed it went into mytrunk and I made sure, when I got it back, that it was in there, filled and ready."

"Any doubt it would be?"

"Nope. Merry's good about that, very conscientious. She knew what props were needed by whom and made sure everything was right. But I'll tell you, it was a pain in the ass having to go for everything when we had to perform. I was glad the Captain said we each had to store our own property. Dale raised such holy hell you could hear her on shore, but I for one was glad."

"So you had the knife, not Tate."

"And I made sure that I had it on me every second."

"Right on the table?" DiNozzo asks.

"Nope," she turns back, gives him a very testing look. "That I did stick in my bra."

x

"So zero second comes," Gibbs says, less to keep the interview on track than to make sure whatever idea she's inspired doesn't go anywhere with the man, "the announcement is made and you had ten seconds left. What went wrong?"

"Harry stood up on time; he was supposed to defuse the argument. When Dale went off script I got confused. When she hit Merry I thought 'oh shit, we're screwed'. Visions of Law Suits, not sugar plums, danced through my head. Then the lights went out, I heard the scuffle and didn't know what to do. I figured all I could do was my job.

"I knew the play was shot to shit but if it could be fixed I had to be ready, so the fix wouldn't fall apart because of anything I did or didn't do."

"And what did you do?"

"Everything was confused. I pulled out the fake knife, really careful that it didn't bleed all over me, and went to where Dale was _supposed_ to be, but of course she wasn't there. I knew I only had ten seconds after the announcement before the lights came up so I did what I was supposed to do, I put the knife under Dale's table and made certain the tablecloth hid it. The lights came on before I could get back to my chair - I'd bumped into someone who slowed me down - but Dale was on the floor, Merry was covered in her blood like Carrie at the Prom and I knew we were way up shit's creek."

"Who did you bump into?"

"I've no idea. The lights were off but when they came on no one was where I thought whoever it was would've been."

"Where's that?"

"Well, on my left. Whoever I bumped into, or who bumped into me, was on my left. I lost my balance, fell a bit to my right, but when the lights came on a couple of seconds later no one was there but Dale on the floor and Merry way off beyond her feet."

"Could it have been Tate?"

"I don't see how. She was too far away, beyond Dale. To get to me, then where she was when the lights came up, she'd have to step over Dale. Probably step in the blood."

There had been no track marks. They hadn't gotten that lucky. "Where was everyone else?" Much of that he has from the initial pictures Palmer had taken, but he wants her recollections as well.

She considers but "I'm sorry, it was too confused. When the lights came up the first thing I saw was Dale and the blood. I didn't see much else, just a lot of bodies standing around me. I think I screamed. I do remember saying that wasn't in the play."

xx

Siobhan and Vicki have carried the equipment used for the Service down to the Hold. "You didn't have to do this," Vicki says as they hang the vestments and place the equipment into boxes.

"Nonsense. Of course I do, if only to see it properly stored for its next use." There are some consecrated Eucharists back in their box; she's written an explanatory note to the next Cleric.

But as she closes the large storage box Vicki turns to her. "May I ask you a question?"

"Of course."

"I watched you before, and..."

"I hope I didn't do anything wrong," she quips.

"I wouldn't know if you did. You see, I don't go to Church much, because on Sundays we're usually at sea, like today, but I was wondering how you do it."

"Go to Church?" It's an intentional misunderstanding to give the woman time to get to an intelligible question. "I practically live there. In fact, for a long time I did."

"No, I mean I watched you. I was in charge of making sure there were enough copies of the Service for everyone, and before putting a set on every chair I _know_ I put one on the table - the Altar - for you. I made double sure that I did."

"Ahhhh."

"You never used it. You never even opened it. You went through 17 pages, plus the Gospel, without even glancing at it. In fact you did quite a bit with your eyes closed. How?"

"A benefit of being blind."

x

Vicki stares at her eyes, but "Nooooooo."

"I was. I spent many years legally blind and getting worse by the month. I used to have to wear these glasses with Coke bottle lenses to keep from slamming into walls. And my doctor told me that eventually my sight would be completely gone. I'd have to conduct the Liturgy in Braille, if at all."

"Completely blind?"

"In less than a year beyond now. But I decided I couldn't stop serving as a Priest, so years ago I studied hard, very hard. I studied the Book of Common Prayer, the Bible, the Book of Occasional Services, everything I could until I could quote them backwards, at least the King James Version, which is my favorite. I was ready for what God intended for me, whatever that might be."

"But you can _see_." This isn't a case of a blind woman compensating phenomenally well.

"Yes, I can."

"What happened? A miracle?"

She carefully considers her answer. "Well, in the sense that God's hand was in it when He inspired men and women who devoted their lives to medicine just as I had to Service. Something happened on New Year's that turned my life completely upside down and as a result I found those people and fulfilled the plan God had for me, the one I couldn't see because of my second blindness."

"And what now?"

"Oh, I'm still blind. Not as much as before, not physically, not when God's light shows me the path He set, but occasionally blind still. As Saint Paul wrote: 'For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face'."

"So now you see clearly."

"But I still stumble, far more often than I'd like."

xx

"All right," Gibbs says when Ziva and Michelle return from escorting Paulsen to her cabin, "Tate looked like a very good suspect, too good to stand up under Rule 31. But if someone set her up, let's look at how they did it."

"She wrote the play, at least the parts McGhost didn't. The script had exactly when the lights would go out and how long they would be off."

"That was all my part. No planning on her part."

"She could have made herself the only obvious suspect," Ziva says, "believing we would reduce her likelihood of being a suspect because of Rule 31, though she of course could know nothing about it." All eyes turn to Tim.

"No, I didn't. Shav was the only one to mention it, and then only to me."

"Nonetheless," Ziva maintains, "we have reduced Tate's likelihood of being the killer for that very reason. As you said earlier, Gibbs, no one intentionally sets herself up as the only possible suspect when she's two hundred miles and twelve hours from a getaway."

x

"She had all the props," Tony continues, "including the fake knife until the Captain had it all spread out. And she knew they would be spread out once McGee went to the Captain. Whoever did it probably intended to substitute the fake for real one, then it would have been Paulsen who killed Hannigan and the blame would fall, if not on Paulsen, then back to Tate."

"I doubt she could be sure the trunks would be spread out," McGee counters. "Granted we might have gone to Stubing and he might have taken action, but would you base a plot on two 'might haves'?"

Michelle also considers that "She was brutalized since the beginning, or so she says, which makes revenge a credible motive."

"The final public assault set her off," Ziva says, "and those seconds led to such confusion that the Bronnes thought she had the knife in her hand when the lights went out."

"BUT," Tony brings it home, "the angle the blade was held in is less than the upward one a smaller person would hold it in from the front, and Tate was a head shorter than Hannigan. If she didn't do it," he pauses to look for a dissenting opinion, "then someone standing behind Hannigan who knew left handed Tate would attack her did it." Gibbs' rising hand makes a firm contact. "Thank you, boss."

This one is for introducing a false assumption which can cloud the logic of the trail. He'd gotten away with the long reach before but wasn't going to survive this. "No one knew Hannigan was going to punch Tate, possibly not even Hannigan until she did it - though she might've had it planned from the top. Everything was confused. But Paulsen was _supposed_ to slit her throat with the fake knife."

"Fake knife to real knife," Tim says. "Are we looking at the wrong fall woman?"

"No," Gibbs decides. "If Paulsen used the wrong knife, she'd've had it in her bra."

"There's no edge or point on the fake," Abby says. "I'm pretty sure she'd notice."

"Who knew there's a real knife?" Tony asks, mentally applauding Abby's talent for understatement. "Whoever did it probably, but not certainly, didn't know where Paulsen would keep the fake. But somebody plans on doing the old switcheroo to get Paulsen to do the deed for the killer. By the time anyone knows Hannigan's not playing possum, it's too late."

Michelle shakes her head. "But Paulsen has the fake with her since she got her trunk back, and on her every second at dinner. There was no opportunity to make the switch. When the murder time comes and the lights are out for the longest time, no one's in position."

"Plus, it takes only a few ounces of pressure on the fake blade to release the faux blood from the reservoir," Abby reminds them, scuttling the entire premise, "but several pounds of pressure to slit someone's throat."

Tony gives her an 'and you let us go through all that?' look. "So where does this leave us, boss?"

"Doing more interrogations. DiNozzo, bring Maxwell in. Let's see how good a detective he is."

xx

Dr. Jeanne Benoit, rather than going alone to Mazatlán as she'd announced, had confirmed with Dr. Palmer that he's finished with such an autopsy as can be done on the ship and when she'd left the agents he'd made his final report. Now, more alone than if she'd gone into the Mexican attraction, she steps out onto the nearly deserted Sun deck, yet the clover pool holds no draw for her. It's no fun to put on a bikini, and working on her tan holds no appeal, when the only one she's interested in looking isn't here to do so.

She does see two familiar people with Isaac Washington at his bar, the Cruise Director and her own counterpart. She supposes that when you've seen Mazatlán two hundred fifty times, you've seen it three hundred.

As she approaches, she sees Bricker's eyes alight with far more than recognition. She'd recognized him as the ship's Lothario within seconds of their first meeting.

"Hello, Doctor," Julie says.

"Good afternoon," Bricker says in what she's sure he considers a suave tone. The fact that he's right doesn't help. In fact, she's sure he's had more than plenty of practice.

"Can I get you something?" Isaac offers.

She tries to keep her lips from giving her away. She's in a mood and will ask for something no one ever has. "How about a Hairy Hangover?"

"Coming right up." He starts pulling the requisite ingredients from the shelves under the bar.

"Wait a minute. You actually _know_ what a Hairy Hangover is?"

"Sure. I know every drink in existence and a few that aren't."

"Hmmm. Lay it on me." The concoction was created by Tony's partner for his second novel, Rock Hollow. Washington had probably looked it up when he'd learned the drink's creator is aboard. She realizes she could have asked for Elves' Mead from his third book, but she's no longer in the mood to trip the man up.

Besides, though McGee hadn't included a formula for that one, the man may be able to make it and then she'd be stuck. All the writer had said about it is that it's like being at the siege of a castle and the north wall falls on your head.

When the glass is put before her, she picks it up and sips cautiously. "Ackk! That is the hairiest hangover I've ever tasted."

Truthfully she never has, but she feels she should let the others know about this.

x

"So," Julie says, "it's at this point I'd ask how you're enjoying the cruise, to see what more I need to do."

"Well, Tony's sequestered with his team interrogating suspects, the autopsy's done - the cause of death, and manner, and mechanism, were obvious within two seconds - and they're using _my_ cabin for the interrogations."

"That's not nice," Julie says.

"So I'm up here."

"We cannot have that," Bricker declares, Cyrano and Don Juan moving in for the thrill. "Would you like to join me for a tour of Mazatlán?"

Maybe the hangover is hairier than she'd thought but she steps down from the stool. "Why not?"

"Maybe you and I could also discuss Comparative Anatomy."

He's already doing an in depth study of hers and she knows whose he wants to compare it to. 'Smooth. But I've heard worse.' She smiles and takes the glass with her.

xx

Charles Maxwell, the detective who so generously gave up his dinner table last evening, now faces real life detectives and is considerably worse for the experience. The first time he'd seen these people they'd pulled out badges and issued orders, and since then they've been in charge of himself and the other Players, keeping them trapped other than for Dale's Religious Service. This time, when the younger Agent came and got him, he'd had even less hope.

"How long have you been acting with the Players?" the older man asks.

"Three years."

"You like it?"

He takes a breath, holds it, eases it out. "Well, let's say I like Dramatic Theater but I could've done without the drama."

"How so?"

"Dale Hannigan came with a lot of baggage."

Behind Maxwell, Gibbs sees DiNozzo and McGee exchange looks. They know where both the physical and emotional baggage wound up.

x

"Tell us about it." This is the period of getting to know the subject, to get a handle on him so they can move on to the things more likely to be lied about.

"There's not all that much to tell, and I don't believe in speaking ill of the dead, no matter how much I'll say about the living."

"Then let's talk about last night."

"What about it?"

"There was a lot of action with the lights, but all nine of you were on the floor."

"That was my job," Maxwell says. "I got together earlier with the Head Electrician, we worked out how it was to be done. At the bar is the Master switch and also a slide bar. He watched me, and when I moved my left hand in any way he killed the lights for a set amount of time, then used the bar to ease them up again. This way he didn't need to follow the script, just to know the right number of seconds for each blackout."

"It was your voice in the announcement."

"Bow tie radio mike, and on the last time the slide was used so power stayed on for the speakers. The ladies have microphones sewn into the collars of their dresses. I dropped my voice down and used a Midwestern accent so no one would recognize it from when I gave up my seat. At least no one was supposed to."

Gibbs gives him a 'what can you do?' shrug. He'd recognized it because a disguised voice usually gives itself away as such and he'd paid closer attention than the average viewer would have.

x

"So what went wrong?"

"I couldn't believe it. Dale, after the foghorn line, was supposed to be talked down by Harry, but she threw in the line about – well, you heard it. For an instant I thought she changed the script and I didn't get the new pages, but that was for only an instant. Merry was caught flat footed and tried to improvise. I think she would've been able to bring things back on track - Harry should've jumped in then - but Dale hauled off and belted her and I knew all Hell was out for noon festivities. When I saw Merry bleeding I realized I hadn't realized how badly fucked we were.

"I killed the lights, hoping the others would be able to pull them apart, maybe get Dale down and we could go on. We'd have to Improv like hell but I figured we'd be able to pull it together. I gave the announcement, which was to tell everyone the lights would come up in ten seconds.

"When the Electrician raised them and I saw from the bar that Dale was on the floor my first thought was 'yes, maybe we can pull it off'. The script called for her to be in her chair, but six of one, half dozen of another. I knew we could do it. It wasn't the first time things had gone to pieces and we put them back together." He looks from one agent to the other and raises his hands in a helpless gesture. "Then Erica screamed, Mike called for a doctor, Judy hollered that this wasn't part of the play, I saw the blood spreading and knew we were done."


	15. I'll Destroy Her

Chapter Fifteen  
I'll Destroy Her

Tim, taking a break from the interviews - it's going to be a very long day and they'll review notes later - returns to his cabin to find it empty. This isn't a surprise since he'd had no idea how long the interviews would last - he never does - and his wife has no reason to 'wait up' for him.

In fact, he imagines she's out celebrating, possibly with Abby and Jeanne, her first International - or else Shipboard - Liturgy. There are several directions she could approach that from.

He decides to join her in the celebration, so he looks through the cabin closets and drawers.

Laundry had been done overnight yet the clothes she wore this morning are neatly folded upon the bed and the green bikini she bought after they'd boarded is gone; that slightly narrows the search parameters. Her sandals are also gone, reinforcing his initial conclusion.

He checks her jewelry drawstring bag but her wedding ring isn't in it. She removes it for swimming in pools like at the 'Y' a few blocks from their apartment because chlorinated water dulls the shine, so she's not planning to swim.

Uh oh.

What isn't in the bag is her small golden crucifix she wears on a gold chain only long enough so she can see it below her neck if she makes an effort. This isn't good. She wears this one if she's feeling badly, if she feels she's done something wrong, expressly because of the effort required to see it. It's her 'Repentance Crucifix'. But what could she feel badly about when he expected she'd be out to celebrate a personal milestone?

He looks to her bureau and the discovery he makes there is no more hopeful. She normally doesn't use much make-up, he always feels she needs none to be gorgeous and her profession is one in which being made-up can be a detraction, but she does use some. She habitually keeps the nine tiny bottles in a tight three by three configuration and the ones out of place are not used close to her eyes.

He opens some of her dresser drawers, but a fast scan shows she took only two other things with her; sunglasses and her silk scarf that's large enough to completely obscure every wisp of her long and distinctive red hair.

She has, in fact, provided for herself an image exactly the opposite of how she'd be recognized after this morning's Service.

He'd come expecting to join a minor celebration. Now he leaves the cabin to find her before a bad situation becomes worse.

xx

Ann Stern had been at the 10:00 position at the large round table, with Meredith Tate on her right and Michael Simmons at her left. Tate had wanted her at the 2:00 space but since she hadn't specified any positions other than for herself and the two men, she'd wound up next to Stern.

Now Stern's in the chair pressed against the foot of DiNozzo's bed, Gibbs seated opposite her and Tony, who looks like he'd rather be laying down, stationed in the corner behind the woman's right, Ziva opposite him. Michelle listens through the partially open connecting door to Jeanne Benoit's cabin.

"What was your part to play last evening?" Gibbs asks. In the script the agents had read, few lines had been allocated to her character. In fact, she'd had far fewer than the corpse's.

"Nothing. I was too far away from the action. I didn't have a part yesterday and I didn't want one. Tomorrow either. I had a few lines as a witness, that was it."

"Not a very meaty role," DiNozzo observes from behind her.

She turns and the glare she gives him would've caused the Pacific Princess to sink from the iceberg collision if they weren't docked. "I didn't want any role. Help Tate secure her position? I was looking forward to doing the other script, abortion though it was, and seeing Dale fire that little bitch and make her walk home.

"I don't know how she came up with the new one but if I can prove she plagiarized even a tiny bit of it from anywhere I'll ruin her. She won't be able to get a part in a Children's Nativity play as the donkey."

"I know none of the Players were supposed to help her," Tony says, "but this seems a little extreme." Actually, it's a lot extreme.

"Help her? I'd sooner have that ship's quack Bricker stitch up my pussy."

x

It takes Tony a moment to recover and Ziva doesn't look at anyone. "So I'm assuming - and correct me if I'm wrong," he says in an attempt to disarm, "that she's not your favorite Player."

"She'd be my favorite corpse, that's it. And that's one role I'm planning on casting her in first chance I'm alone with her."

'Uh oh. Red flag time. But can I turn this into an early confession?' "You think she killed Hannigan?"

"Of _course_ she did, you damned idiot! You saw her do it! You saw her slit poor Dale's throat! And I'm gonna get her for it. She'd better pray they put her away for Life, because if she ever gets out I'm going to kill her!"

Gibbs pulls her attention forward. If ever he needed a reason for Rule Number 1... "There's no doubt in your mind that she's guilty?"

"It proves Dale was right all along about the little bitch."

"In what way?"

"We gave the twat a chance and she murdered Dale right in front of us. How much more right could she have been? I warned her not to turn her back on that little slut. We should have seen it coming when she wrote the murder happened in the dark."

"Tell us about it," DiNozzo invites.

Stern looks back, her tone acidic. "Dale tried to keep her in line, didn't let the fucking slit get uppity, made her work for her keep just as we all had to."

"What work?" Gibbs asks, pulling her up front.

"All work. Let her pull her weight."

"Like the trunks?" Tony puts in, obliging her to turn back again. This is beginning to resemble a tennis match.

"Exactly. I had to in my time, we all did."

"Part of the Initiation?" Gibbs asks.

"Right."

x

That is an interesting view as Paulsen, the intended assassin, had said this woman was with the group from the first day. She came in responsible for the then trio's belongings?

"How long have you been with the Players?" Gibbs asks, always preferring to have the answer before he asks the question.

"Right from the start. Dale and I started the group, recruited the actors, booked the gigs, did everything and then this little bitch came in and thought she was going to be our _Manager_? Dale put her in her place hard enough. Now it's my turn."

"How so?" Tony asks.

She turns to bite him. "With Dale dead I'm the next in line. I've been here the longest."

"And Peter Finch." Gibbs cuts in.

She faces him again. "What?"

"Peter Finch. You three started together, didn't you?"

"He doesn't count. The man's pushing 70. What has he got, a few years this side of the grave? No, I'm in charge, and once I get out of here that cunt is done."

"Even if she turns out not to have killed Hannigan?" Tony tests.

"Makes no difference. And if she thought she had it hard before, just wait. She even _tries_ to hang on, I'll destroy her."

x

"What happened yesterday?" Ziva serves this round, forcing Stern to turn completely around to the woman on her left.

"Tate showed her true colors, that's what happened. She snuck up on her in the dark and slit her throat."

"You fucking bitch," Gibbs says softly.

"I - _WHAT_?" She spins hard enough to give herself whiplash. "HOW _DARE_ YOU?"

Normally he would not lead as he had, but Stern needed shaking up in her story. "That's what Tate screamed. She came up off the table, screamed 'you fucking bitch' and charged her before the lights went out."

"Well, I - that is..." But she rallies quickly. "She wrote the script. She was planning on murdering Dale all along."

Ziva picks up with "She wrote Hannigan being killed at her table by Judy Paulsen with the trick knife." The interview now resembles mixed doubles playing off Gibbs. "If both of them had gone for her throat in that few seconds of darkness, they would have collided with each other."

There had been a collision with Paulsen, and she wishes she knew with whom, but they'll work it out. She's certain Paulsen had had a close encounter with the real killer.

"Then Judy was in on it. She had the knife."

"The fake knife," Tony declares, making her turn about again, "the one without an edge or a point."

" _Noooo_ ," she says, as though educating a dunce. "She had the real knife. She passed it over to Tate when the lights were out."

"Paulsen had the sharp knife," Gibbs returns, pulling her forward.

"Obviously."

Tony goes for the Point. "Inside her bra."

\- - - "Well..."

Gibbs turns to the door to his left. "Palmer."

The connecting door opens. "Yes, sir?" Michelle asks.

He cocks his thumb toward the main door. "Bring McCabe."

"You mark my words," Stern bites. "Tate did it, you'll see!"

x

When she's gone, Tony says "She's at the top of my list. In fact, it's the third time she's made my list."

"It's the first motive I've heard."

"You think she killed Hannigan to take the top spot?" Ziva asks.

"Taking over an Acting Troupe as a motive for murder?" Gibbs asks, not sure if he should be incredulous. "You know what's so bad about that motive?"

"We have had worse?"

"We've had worse."

xxx

It's not difficult at all for Tim to find his wife, not after his inspection of their cabin had provided all the clues he needed. Bikinied, she's on deck. Exultant, which she certainly is not, she'd be at the bow. Curious or sightseeing, she'd be starboard - though if she'd disembarked she'd be dressed. Contemplative, port side looking out to the ocean and the distant Baha California Sur peninsula beyond, if it can even be seen from here. Depressed, she'll be at the stern and it's there he finds her when he looks down from the Sun deck, leaning on the curved fantail rail.

Beyond the green bikini which presents her as far as possible from her vested image of over an hour ago - and it's a very nice presentation indeed - the large scarf which covers her head completely hides her distinctive red hair. Anyone else, if searching for the priest who had led the Liturgy earlier, would walk right by her.

He never will.

x

He descends the companionways, steps beside her and waits until she's pulled by his presence from whatever contemplation consumes her.

"Timmy."

He can barely see her eyes through the dark lenses, but he can read them. "At first I thought you'd want to celebrate."

She frowns as though the word were new. "Celebrate what?"

"Your first International Liturgy. Shipboard Service. Whatever."

She looks out at the land and water, a hard juxtaposition stretching for miles.

"No." She sinks lower into her body as she turns and leans upon the rail. "I would like to have, but no."

He looks around, other people take in the view on both left and right, those few who haven't gone into town yet. He reaches out to touch her arm, waits until she'll look up at him. "Cén fáth, nuair ba chóir duit a bheith sásta, nuair ba chóir duit a bheith ag ceiliúradh, tá tú chomh brónach?"

x

She's worked hard over the past year to teach him Gaelic so they could have privacy in the private moments, and he wants to know 'Why, when you should be happy, when you should be celebrating, are you so sad?'

She looks back to the distant horizon but it takes a long moment for her to whisper in tones of utter shame "Tá mé feall ar an spiorad cad tá mé ar a dtugtar a dhéanamh."

"I'm sorry, I don't know that."

She looks back up to him, disappointed or annoyed he's not sure which. "I said 'I've betrayed the spirit of what I am called to do'."

"No, I know what you said, I just don't think you're right. In fact, I think you're very wrong."

This makes her push herself off the rail, face him directly, eyes narrow behind the sunglasses. "How can you say that?"

"Inis dom conas feall tú rud ar bith." He wants her to tell him how she betrayed anything.

Her frustration is born of guilt, but her Gaelic words keep their conversation private. " _I used their Sacramental Confessions to make one of them betray him- or herself. I should have told_ Jethro _to shove his plan. It's as if I broke Sacramental Seal myself._ "

" _You didn't_."

" _Please,_ Timmy _, do not compound my crime by lying to me._ "

" _I'm not. Why do you think we're doing Interrogations?_ Gibbs _tried to get actors to give themselves away through expression or body language. Of course it failed._ "

"Thank God!"

x

He can't help but smile at her exultant cry, even if it brings them back to English. He'll keep them there. "That's the first time I've heard you happy that we failed."

"Oh, of course, darling, I'm not. But given–"

"I understand. But instead of betraying anything you gave peace and hope to people who were hurting, who miss their friend; and if that isn't your Calling, I don't know what is."

It's a long time before she can answer but "You're right."

Using his index finger and pinky, he pushes the ends of her lips upward. "Feel better?"

She captures his hand between hers. "Strangely enough, yes."

"Good. But I have to get back. Tell you what, why don't you hunt up Abby and Jeanne and do whatever it is that women do while men work?"

"Oooooooo, mister, you have just earned a couple of whacks in a place Jethro never targets."

"Lately I'm not too sure of that." He kisses her and then, his break over, he returns to Fiesta 105.

xx

"Oh, Captain?" Julie McCoy's voice turns Merrill Stubing around as he walks with Adam Bricker along the Lido s outer rail rather than the inner passageways. He sees the blue uniformed woman lead a young couple on an intercept course. When she reaches them, the Cruise Director hopes that "I'm not interrupting anything, am I?"

"Not at all. I'm on my Availability Stroll." At certain times of the day he makes a slow round of the seven exterior passenger decks for the express purpose of being accessible to the passengers who might want to bring something up to the Captain. This time he's with Adam and Julie is aiding in that accessibility.

"This is Joseph Wagner and Mary Clark."

"How do you do?"

"Terribly, Captain," Joseph admits.

"Would you marry me?" Mary appeals.

x

"I beg your–"

"Us, Captain," Joseph clarifies.

"Us," Mary confirms, more deeply flustered.

"You see, sir," Julie gives him a capsule explanation of the fraud perpetuated upon the couple and their dilemma.

"I sympathize," Stubing says, "but un–"

"We heard that Ship's Captains have the power to perform weddings," Mary presses.

"Yes, once that was true. For a very long time Ship's Masters did have that authority, and it was one of my greatest pleasures as the Master of this ship." He watches their faces fall in slow motion descent and strives to shorten the agony.

"Unfortunately the Maritime Commission rescinded that authority quite a few years ago. I'm sorry."

There is no need to prolong the agony by telling them that those Captains who became Justices of the Peace retain that power, for he had chosen not to pursue that path in favor of engaging Clergy for shipboard unions.

"Merrill," Adam, at his side, says in his helpful, accommodating manner that, "we do happen to have a Priest on board. I'm sure she'll–"

"She refused," Mary bites.

"Come again?"

"Turns out _she_ isn't Licensed either."

"Now, honey, to be fair that's not exactly what she said–"

"I _know_ what she said, _Joseph_!"

He turns to Stubing and the others, holding in mind that they do want to be helpful. "She's Licensed in middle East Coast States."

"Yes, that's important," Stubing confirms. "Marriage is as much Civil as Religious; those who perform marriages can only practice and file documents of Marriage in the States in which they're Licensed." That has been a major consideration that concluded his decision to engage visiting Clergy.

"Plus she said she can't marry Catholics."

"Mary–"

"I _know_ what she _said_! She can do this big Service for some dead woman but can't help us!"

x

"It's my own fault," Wagner admits, wanting to be out of this conversation but unable to think of how short of dragging his venting non-wife away, "for thinking it would be less complicated by not going to a Church but just getting it done by someone I found on-li–"

Mary whirls on him. "Next time you'll listen to me!" She stalks off, a hazard for anyone in front of her.

Joseph looks to the three, tries to find some words but is too humiliated to speak, then he sets out in pursuit.

"Tears your heart," Bricker says, "doesn't it?"

"This," Stubing declares, "is shaping up as my least favorite cruise."


	16. Litany of Hate

Chapter Sixteen  
Litany of Hate

"After the line about the foghorn," Harold McCabe tells Gibbs, McGee and DiNozzo in the latter's cabin, not knowing or perhaps not caring that David and Palmer listen through the slightly open door to Benoit's commandeered cabin, "I was supposed to be peacemaker. Seems I'm always having to be peacemaker with people over Dale, so Merry cast well."

McCabe had been at the 6:00 position at the round table, Meredith Tate on his left and Judy Paulsen, the intended assassin, on his right. He had stood up on cue but had been left with no time to do anything.

"What do you mean, 'peacemaker'?" Gibbs asks. The other two men are poised to offer distractions as the opportunities arise.

"Well, you may not have noticed, but Dale could be a little acerbic at times."

Gibbs hardly feels the need to mention that he'd noticed. The woman had come near to putting hair on Merrill Stubing's head at Friday evening's dinner.

"She rubbed people the wrong way somewhat regularly," he admits. "Being front man for the Players was frequently a challenge."

x

"So what happened at the play?"

"Dale was supposed to sit back down at her table, using the other chair so her back was to us, a somewhat broad snub by the Duchess Von Bombast to the Commoner and her gaggle, and Merry was supposed to sit back in her chair at my left and wasn't supposed to move again."

So the Stage Direction had read. Gibbs feels it's nice to have copies of what should have happened when the reality had diverged so sharply.

"The lights were supposed to go down and when they came up ten seconds after the announcement we were all supposed to be at the round table, Dale was supposed to be face down at hers with her throat slit."

"Who was the murderer supposed to be?" She had been, for that reason, interviewed first.

"Judy Paulsen, who was seated at my right. It was supposed to be a political hit on the bombastic Duchess. Merry was supposed to be the Red Herring. She'd argued with Dale, but that punch was completely out of line. I don't blame Merry one bit for blowing her top."

"So we were always supposed to think Tate was guilty?" That's how the pages read.

"She gave herself the meatiest role." He smiles, spreads his hands. "Author's prerogative. For my Master's Piece I gave myself all the best lines." He considers for a moment. "Come to that, we all did. Human nature. We work hard on our Master's Piece - plus since there can't be anyone to help, there's no one who can say we can't."

x

"I understand there was bad blood between Hannigan and Tate."

"I don't know what caused it, but it's been there since Day One for those two. We elected Merry and it became like the Hundred Years War all pressed into one."

"What did you elect her as?"

"Oh, no, not _as_ anything, or maybe yes; as a member. The Players audition new talent. By our By-Laws, which no one reads anyhow, there are nine members." He shrugs. "Don't ask me why. Dale wrote it and she was the By-Laws Committee. Maybe in the days before me someone fantasized we'd be a democracy and so shot for an odd number. As I admit, I read it once four years ago when I came on, looked around and saw that real life was nothing like the paperback and promptly forgot most of it.

"When Al Endberg quit, we opened the spot and something like thirty people auditioned that day. Merry, well, she pretty much blew half of them out of the water on the first go 'round. The second eliminations narrowed it down to eight, and then we voted."

"And Tate won?"

"Simple majority. Eight of us voted for eight, I think she got three votes, which was all she needed."

"And that's when the bad blood started flowing?" DiNozzo asks.

McCabe snorts. "Like a monsoon in Transylvania. Dale was pushing for this guy. He was good, no problem there. He got two votes and the remaining three were spread among the other six finalists."

"And Hannigan blamed Tate?"

"Unfairly. All eight candidates were in one room, we were in the other, there was no way they could influence anyone. There wasn't supposed to be any politicking in our room, but of course Dale did."

"You vote for Tate or the other guy?"

"Neither; I voted my notes and I thought someone else was better than any of the others, but I was the only one who did. Fine with me. I saw the guy's name on a Broadway Playbill two months back while we were doing Dinner Theater in Soho, so I doubt he's suffering."

"But Tate?"

"From that day Dale treated Merry like Class 9 shit. Nothing that poor girl could do was right. She blasted her at every rehearsal, gave her grief after every performance."

x

"But the Acting side wasn't the worst."

"What was?" Usually an Interview is like a visit to the dentist, but Gibbs is beginning to appreciate actors. It pays, it seems, to open the floor to someone whose profession is to get out and talk - provided, of course, that the lines are the truth.

"Business. Now Merry told me, before she brought it up to the others - probably got the sense that I would listen - that she has an ambition to be both Actor and Manager of a Company. But the day she tried to _use_ her Business Degree - she has a Master's I think - you could've heard Dale wherever it is you work."

"Didn't take to the idea?"

"A real pity, I think, because we could've benefited from someone who went to College for it; I can't handle my Investments without Charles Schwab. But Dale and Ann - Ann Stern - ganged up on her and swayed Pete and Erika so the idea got voted down. Dale played the 'newcomer' card and none of us really knew Merry well enough back then. After that, there was nothing she could do."

"Nothing?"

"Oh, she tried. She said we should have an Accountant, an Investment Strategy; CDs, Money Market, the works. She had all this paperwork to make her point. We have real money here, but everything she suggested Dale shot down and attacked her. Her experience, her training, her school work, her _morals_ \- whatever that had to do with anything I don't know. Dale made her out to be a thief, only wanted our money, then she would disappear."

"You guys bought that?" DiNozzo asks.

"Like I said, we were just getting to know her. But it was just one facet of a huge campaign. She sabotaged everything that poor girl did."

"Such as?"

"Such as I remember three months ago a rehearsal was on a Saturday, she told her Sunday, then docked her three days pay for No-Call/No-Show."

"Full of tricks, wasn't she?" Tim says, anger flowing through his voice.

"Bad," Gibbs grants, "but resolvable." He's looking for a reason to slit the woman's throat.

"Okay, you want a topper? Three weeks ago, Opening Night of a three day stint in Louisiana, there was a rewrite on an important scene and Merry had the pivotal role. It was a major rewrite and we found out later that Dale made sure Merry didn't get the pages. Came the moment for the changed scene, we were saying things she'd never read and expecting her to give her lines back for us and she was completely lost. She just stood in the middle of the stage and had no idea what was going on around her.

"We could see it and realized what was wrong, but not only couldn't we help then and there but she had no lines to feed us. We tried to Improv, couldn't do it because we had our characters who couldn't give her lines or suddenly appear psychic and the entire thing crashed and burned. Dale came out from stage left and flayed her alive in front of a packed house."

"Nice woman."

x

"She actually got a Reviewer in one of the towns in Appalachia to single her out for a shitty review while the rest of us got raves. It was her first Co-Starring role in a Love story Judy wrote especially with her in mind. She'd really wanted to shine.

"Mike was the boyfriend, I played her father; we three had rehearsed a dozen times and I _knew_ she had it down pat. On stage she was brilliant, she made me wish I could've switched with Mike, yet this Reviewer took Dale's money and ripped her throughout the County."

"Must've really hurt," DiNozzo says.

"Poor girl cried for a week."

x

"Why'd she put up with it?" Gibbs asks.

"Dale's got her by the short hairs, or had her, rather."

"What does that mean?"

"Any one of us can walk out at any time and we have a Retirement Fund coming to us. Everyone except Merry."

"What Retirement Fund?" McCabe had put it in caps.

"It's a separate account, built equal to half of each of our salaries and funded by Box Office receipts, separate from our Contracted fee. We get ten thousand per gig, by the way, plus that cut of the Box for the special account. Between us we call it the Nest Egg.

"If I gave Notice, I'd be entitled to a sum equal to half of everything I ever made since joining the Players, a very _nice_ chunk of change, I assure you.

"It's a Nest Egg, as I said, intended to send someone off in good stead. Not every actor leaves a Repertory Company and goes on Broadway. We _might_ , but that's the exception. We had one member who took his money and started his own troupe. Endberg, the guy who Merry replaced, he opened a store and, last I heard, it's doing fairly well, but I don't know about my future, you know?"

"And Tate?"

"Well, she's still a Yearling. In your first year if you walk out it's 'adios, amiga'. You have to show commitment to the troupe, otherwise we'd have people coming for a 'Summer Stock', then looking to cash out with 50% severance."

"So if she quits before one year?"

"She gets nothing, though after the year her portion starts out as though she'd accumulated it from day one, so if she leaves the day after her anniversary next month she's entitled to her year's cut. So Dale's been doing everything she can to make her walk before then. That trunk issue was just one ongoing facet."

x

"What was with that?" Tim asks. When he'd walked into her cabin on Friday afternoon, he and Shav had barely fit into a cabin as large as this Single.

"There was no reason to burden Merry with our junk. Before she came everyone was responsible for his or her own crap and I for one liked that fine. There's some things that when I want them I want to open my box and get them, not go the length of a ship or hotel."

"Ann Stern says you each had to have the trunks in your room during your Probie days," Tony says, "that it didn't start with Tate."

"What? Nonsense. Ask any one of us. It started with Merry."

Gibbs intends to, but he's more interested in what Stern thought to accomplish with the story. Or conversely, what McCabe thinks he'll accomplish with his.

x

"Why the long haul for the trunks?"

"That was another of Dale's little zingers. Wherever we were, Merry was always far away in some convenient hole - convenient for Dale, that is. It was her way of rubbing Merry's nose in it, that she didn't belong or wasn't part of us.

"Oh how she ranted and raved when we came aboard and the Cruise Director noticed what she thought was a mistake. It was no mistake; Dale called two weeks ago and booked her three decks down, across and at the furthest end of the ship. The Cruise Director did a little paperwork slight-of-hand, probably thought she was being pretty clever - she was, I'll grant her that - and put Merry in with us and whoever had that cabin in the one Dale had tried to consign Merry to."

"So this campaign against her?"

"If Merry gets fired, like she might have with that script being what it was; I'll never know how she managed to pull it out at the last minute. I guess you can do anything if you're back's to the wall.

"Well, if she'd failed, Dale would've really screwed her. Maybe even fire her and, since she then wouldn't be a paid guest on the ship, turn around and make her pay her passage out of what would have been her salary rather than be thrown off the ship in Mexico and have to thumb her way back to Miami.

"But if Merry walked out on her own before her year was up she wouldn't get a penny. Next month she'll be entitled to a year's half-salary and I think she was holding out for that - the light at the end of the tunnel - as much as Dale was trying to drive her out three weeks before her anniversary."

x

"How did the others feel about all this?"

"You'll have to ask them. To us we were all united, but face it, we're actors. We're paid to lie convincingly. Me, I'm amazed sometimes that she took it. I wouldn't've."

"You know, in all the interviews we did, you're the only one who backs Tate." It's an exaggeration but he doesn't mind. Interrogation is a game of get as much accurate information as possible while surrendering nothing reliable.

"Well, I don't know about that. It's just, well, I've always had a soft spot for the underdog, you know? And the more Merry got picked on, the more I think I gravitated to her. She's a good kid; she didn't deserve Dale being a bitch to her every single day.

"But that last ad lib... We're professionals, you know? You do not ad lib to purposely throw someone out of a scene, but Dale did. That would've been enough for me; we all saw she did it to mess her up - but that punch, that was the straw that broke the camel's back. I'm not a bit surprised she blew her top."

"Do you think she did it?"

"Killed Dale? I've never met anyone with a better set of reasons, but no, I do not."

"Who do you suppose did it?" He knows it's a long shot, so he isn't too surprised when McCabe shrugs.

"Someone with an even better reason."


	17. We're Paid To Lie

Chapter Seventeen  
We're Paid to Lie

Siobhan, walking along the starboard side of the Lido deck, finds in profile one of the familiar faces she'd been searching for. The white and black uniformed man looks out over the rail at Mazatlán, yet it seems without interest. "Lieutenant?"

He turns and she can tell from his eyes on her bikini clad body that what he's been taking in doesn't entirely include what's under the large scarf and behind the sunglasses.

"Gopher," he invites in what she considers to be very intimate tones. His eyes stroke her again but still don't spend much time above her neck. The crucifix doesn't seem to help, not when so many people wear it as jewelry. "What can I do for you?"

She hears some ideas, but to say any of them would get him keel-hauled if the Captain were to overhear. His suave and hopeful tone says quite clearly that whatever it might be he hopes to do for her would take a long time and wouldn't involve crowds. "Your slightest wish will be my heartfelt command."

"I really hope you will be able to do something for me, Gopher." She slightly accentuates the 'for' in case he's thinking the 'to' that his eyes had yelled.

She sees that he heard her this time for his eyes change and all the blood drains from his face. She supposes it's because even though he can't see a lot of her face she doesn't have a California girl accent. Hers is very much to the east.

"Oh my _God_. I'm–"

"Let us forget this confusion, shall we, Lieutenant?" she suggests as she removes her sunglasses. The color does return to his face, and double that, "We shall simply take the thought for the deed."

"No deed. No thought! I was just standing here not thinking. Completely not thinking. Now if you'll excuse me I'm going to jump overboard, you can give me Last Rites and we'll be square."

She looks out to Mazatlán and then straight down to the dock. "I don't know that the fall would be fatal, but you'll likely spend a great deal of time with Doctor Bricker."

"He can wrap my head in gauze so I don't have to show my face. I am so _sorry_."

"We'll make it our little secret. But as I was about to say," before he can add any more self-recriminations, "I do need you help."

"I'm at your service. Figuratively speaking."

"I need to make a ship-to-shore call."

He glances left, then to her. "You could yell."

"Ah, true. But I doubt they'd hear me in Los Angeles. You see, I have no bars out here; my provider doesn't cover Mexico."

"I see. No problem. Come with me and I'll get you set up."

xxx

"Tony, Ziva, look into that Nest Egg," Gibbs orders when Michelle returns from having escorted Harold McCabe back to his Cabin. "Palmer, make with the Affidavit thingamabob."

"Sir," Michelle asks, "can I even get a Warrant if no one's supposed to know we're working a case?"

"I don't know, Lee. _Can_ you?"

The jibe is a double one, harking back to the days before her marriage when she'd been a green Probie too terrified of messing up and too jittery to take action on her own. "I can _do_ it. Sir."

"Have someone do the leg work and fax us the details." He looks to Tony and Ziva. "Then you two dig into it."

"Any clue what we're looking for, boss?"

"Equivalent of two and a half years salaries for nine people, you're looking for a lot."

"Right."

"Meantime–"

"Meantime, boss, with the Interviews going on here, Jeanne's been locked out of her cabin all day."

He frowns. "She can use it."

"Well, with the door open so Ziva and Michelle can hear–"

"Don't you trust her, DiNozzo?" The woman has been on the inside of every aspect of the case since the first strike of the knife.

By his stiff expression DiNozzo shows the thoughts or feelings he would keep from his tone. "I trust her."

"Then we're settled." He has only one interview of any consequence left to do today. The remainders will have to wait upon the money. "McGee, you have Hannigan's laptop?"

"Of course."

"Then find out about that Nest Egg from that end."

"Get the Account Numbers," Tony advises. "We'll need them for the Warrants for the bank statements. Then Probette can make with the Affidavit thingy."

"Affidavit _thingy_?" She'd already been given this order - for the thingamabob.

"We'll turn you into a Gibbs any time now," McGee predicts of the man.

"Meantime," Gibbs says, "all of you unwind. We can't do much until that money stuff comes in. Go to dinner, relax. There'll be more later."

No one delays in following that order.

xxx

Julie McCoy has noticed that while his team mates are either well established in relationships or display no trouble filling their social calendars, whenever Special Agent Gibbs comes into one of the Lounges he's either alone or with one of his agents.

When he was alone she'd tried over these past three days to pair him with some attractive unescorted woman of his years, but while he was cordial and polite, the meal never went beyond that stage and the feedback she'd received indicated there was little interest in second dates.

Not one to give up, and her job doesn't allow that option, when Gibbs comes into the Coral Room for his solitary dinner at a table for two she steps over to join him. "Agent Gibbs?"

x

"Jeth–" He started to correct her, but something stuck in his throat.

"Jeth."

'Why not?' he asks with a mental shrug. He's been called worse by a beautiful woman. "Before you say it, I know your job as Social Director means you have to to fix up passengers, but after a day sifting through lies and alibis I'm not pleasant company. This time let's take the thought for the action."

"Yes, sir. I promise not to try to set you up with anyone else."

"Thank you."

"But actually there _is_ a very nice woman on board who wants to get to know you better. She thinks you and what you do are both absolutely fascinating."

He's about to refuse but "Well, you did have this before we agreed, so bring her over."

"One more chance?"

"Yeah."

She pulls out the chair and sits down. "Good, because I have been dying to meet the real Leroy Jethro Gibbs."

xx

In the Riviera Lounge, restored to its original purpose, Tony DiNozzo and Jeanne Benoit try to enjoy what they'd hoped would be a relaxing meal. Neither is comfortable dining in this room even though they're distant from the dance floor, but no alternative arrangements had been made. After the tensions of the day, steak isn't the only thing between them that can be cut with a knife.

"All I'm saying is that if I had known back on Thursday morning that you were coming out here to investigate a murder–"

"I didn't know. How could I?"

"I wouldn't have cashed in my vacation time."

"Look, we're pretty much done with the interviews–"

"Interviews."

"Civilized Interrogations."

"All right."

"Only one of any consequence left, the guy who played the Head Waiter. Gibbs wants to talk to him after dinner, but we can't do a lot more today. Our people in DC will be at Court in the morning to see about a Warrant for some records, then head out to the bank and then fax out everything. That way we don't really have to admit to the Director that we're working instead of relaxing."

"Well, you're not relaxing; I can vouch for that."

"What do you want us to do? Is this any different from when you're five minutes from off shift and they carry in survivors from a three car pile-up?"

It's enough to tear the fight from her. Neither can refuse any more than the other can. True, she'd watched him vote with the others to work this case rather than relax - he'd fought for it in fact - but if what she's heard about Mexican prisons is even half true and Meredith Tate is being railroaded...

"When will you know?"

"We figure with the time difference it'll be late tomorrow morning before we get their answers. Assuming the Warrants come through quickly, our Agents can pull the bank records before their noon, get them to us a little after our breakfast."

"So what you're saying is that after this one chat you're mine until tomorrow."

"I sure hope so."

xxx

"Where's McBridegroom?" Tony asks in his overused and overcrowded cabin. The Palmers are here, as are Abby and Jeanne, all being determined to hold Gibbs to his declaration that this is the last interview of the day. The Pacific Princess will cast off from Mazatlán in three hours, the coastal tourist attraction unseen by anyone other than Jeanne.

"He's working on Hannigan's computer," Gibbs says, his tone conveying 'that should be obvious, because it's what I told him to do. And since he's not here, neither is his wife,' he finishes as silently.

"I thought he was playing hooky."

"Soon as Ziva gets here with Finch and we can finish, we're all playing hooky. This has been too long a work day on a vacation."

"Amen," Jeanne says as she turns and goes through the connecting door to her cabin. "Wake me when it's _over_."

x

Ziva presents white haired Peter Finch, no longer the tuxedoed Maître d' but a casual ship's guest in shorts and Hawaiian shirt, then retires, switching via the passageway to Jeanne's cabin with Michelle and the doctor.

Tony places Finch in the 'hot seat', backed against the foot of his bed while he takes his usual position in the corner near the pillow he'd really rather use now.

"How long have you been with the Players?" Gibbs asks, wanting to make this short but knowing it can only take as much time as it does.

"Five years ago this past April; Dale, Ann Stern and I started it."

"You do a lot of performances?"

"We've built up a steady clientèle in addition to our continuing to hunt up new venues. We do about thirty five, forty plays a year."

"Must be quite a strain, memorizing all those scripts."

"Not for me. I started on the stage as a professional at seventeen, been doing it ever since. And it's fewer scripts than you think, less than thirty, but if you learn how to study, you never lose it."

"Ever think about retirement?"

"No. I've still got a lot of good years left in me."

x

"Were you and Dale Hannigan close?"

"We've been friends forever. We worked together a long time, did a lot of plays down through the decades, long before she came up with the idea of her own troupe. She approached me because she needed backing and I had money in those days. I bankrolled the Players in our first year and something. Not the smartest investment I could've made."

"How so?"

"To put it bluntly, since it's all public record and you probably know already, for most of the first year we lost our shirts. If not for Dale's drive, her refusal to give up, we'd've gone belly up within the first eight months. But she drove, held us together, and by the end of the first year we started turning a profit. That's all public record so I know you know."

Gibbs doesn't intend to disappoint the man. "So if the Players break up now that Hannigan's dead, what happens to your investment?"

"Well again, public record. Between my Investment dividend and a separate Retirement Account I'd walk away with over one hundred eighty thousand dollars."

"Nice chunk of change," he grants, echoing Harold McCabe. "Now what happened on Saturday?" He'll revisit the matter of money after a few more detours. In the meantime, he'll see what the man will say that's not on the record.

"I don't know what I can tell you, you saw it all."

"Not all."

"I know. The lights."

"Made things hard."

"For all of us."

"I understand you all have night vision goggles."

"Sure wish I had mine, but the darn things are so big they ruin the lines of tuxedos, and the women have a harder problem. Since I was the Maître d' I had to go for elegant and dignified. I think that's why Tate made that scene a fancy dinner, so no one could carry anything."

"You think she did it?"

"Pretty obvious. She wrote the script, selected the props, put everyone where she wanted them."

'Planned the punch,' Gibbs doesn't say. That was the moment when all plans had gone south, except for those of the murderer.

x

"Let's consider for a moment. If not for the fight and Hannigan being attacked in the confusion, what would have happened?"

"I don't follow."

"The lights went out. According to the Stage Directions, Maxwell was to wait seven seconds, then make his announcement, that took eight seconds. The lights were to start coming up ten seconds later. Everyone's agreed the announcement was the ten second warning. For twenty five seconds we were all in the dark."

"Sounds about right."

"Now let's look at it from the killer's point of view. Dale Hannigan sits down in her other chair, this one with her back to the round table as a snub and the lights go out. Judy Paulsen, playing the murderer, comes over with the fake knife, runs it along Hannigan's neck to leave the blood, puts the knife under the table and makes it back to her chair. Paulsen says she memorized the positions. That whole operation could take ten seconds or so, she would be in her chair with Hannigan playing possum before the announcement finishes. But there's still ten to fifteen seconds left."

"So?"

"So during that time the murderer could leave his or her seat, slit Hannigan's throat for real and know exactly how long he or she had to get back and look innocent. By the time Hannigan was found to be really dead it would have been too late."

"Not a bad theory, except it doesn't exonerate anyone."

"No, it doesn't."

x

"You were pretty broken up over Hannigan's death." He'd run in, grabbed up the dying woman, nearly hysterical at what had happened to her. DiNozzo had had to forcibly separate them before he could have contaminated the Crime Scene further than he had.

"Of course I was."

"More so than the others."

"I've known her longer than any of them. They've only known her for at most five years, I have for over thirty. I cared about her - naturally I was more upset by Tate killing her."

"You grabbed her."

"Sorry about that, I was out of my head. My friend was dead and I - I suppose I went a little crazy."

"Of the eight of you, who do you think did it?"

"That's the only thing obvious about this whole thing. Tate."

"Why do you suppose she did?"

"I don't know. You'll have to ask her."

"We did."

"And?"

"She said she didn't do it."

"Well, that's the thing about us actors."

"What's that?"

"We're paid to lie."


	18. Save The Last Dance For Me

Chapter Eighteen  
Save the Last Dance For Me.

Immediately after the Saturday post-midnight vote and the still unexplained drama centering around the Palmers, Gibbs, DiNozzo and McGee had searched Hannigan's cabin and, as they'd expected, had found her laptop computer. McGee had taken control of it, took it to his cabin to examine it and immediately retired to bed.

Sunday began with the early morning Recap and the Service, was overfull with Interviews and ended at sundown with the nine trying their best to salvage what was left of their evening.

Fortunately, on a cruise ship such as the Pacific Princess, socializing and entertainment are in plenteous supply. Dinner and dancing in all the ballrooms, though they avoid the Riviera in favor of the Acapulco Lounge, run on full and the agents and their fellows arrive separately, determined to cast the pall of recent events aside in celebration of the cruise.

That it doesn't happen as planned can easily be attributed to human nature. One cannot experience a murder and then investigate the same, including over a hundred preliminary interviews of the guests who constitute a version of the general public and then go out into said public without fallout.

x

Jeanne and Tony enjoy the benefits of a very slow, very close dance when a woman's voice on his right says "I guess since you're here dancing, you arrested the murderer."

It's rude to ignore even the rude and Tony is not habitually rude unless driven to it - which could happen before the night ends - so he turns to the middle aged couple. He supposes the evening is cool enough for mink, but in Jeanne's arms he doesn't feel that cool.

"Not quite, but we're very close."

Looking at the woman in his arms and the lack of appropriate daylight between them, even the rotating colored lasers that bounce off the three mirrored balls scattered through the room can barely slip in, the woman says "I can see that," before the man, not meeting their eyes, dances her away.

"Maybe this was a mistake," he says.

"Not on your life, Mister." She tugs him an inch closer. "Not only have we not had a true minute to ourselves since last evening - which you are going to make up to me - but it's my responsibility to see that you unwind on what's left of this cruise."

"Don't worry about that." He tries to keep it short of a plea.

"I'm not mentioning that Evaluation, because if I do you'll only tense up and defeat the whole purpose of this dance, let alone this cruise. I'm going to dedicate the next three days to making sure you have fun."

"In which case, it's far too crowded here."

"Well, unless you can get the band to play a tango, that 'dance that's the most fun you can have while standing up and wearing clothes', you're going to have to settle for 'Moonlight Becomes You'."

"It does you." he assures her, bringing her even another inch closer. "And–"

"Did you arrest her yet?"

x

Jeanne looks to the couple on her right and dispenses a poisonous smile. "We're negotiating my sentence even as we speak."

The woman is taken aback; Jeanne is not the woman she'd expected. "Why did you do it?"

"She interrupted my dances."

But the woman evidently won't be put off. "You should be in handcuffs."

She waves a bare wrist. "I'm not into that. But Agent DiNozzo does work with someone who brings a whole new dimension to B&D. Perhaps I could introduce you."

"Sorry, Jeanne," Tony says, "Sammy's tied up." This time it's he who dances his partner away. "This isn't going to work."

"I'm going to _make_ it work, even if we have to dance the next dance on the bridge."

"I'm impressed you kept your patience."

"As they say, what's a doctor without patients?"

"An M.E."

"If I can answer 'speaking of intestinal parasites, how's your father?' with a straight face, I can handle a rude dancer."

"How about handling your patient?"

"Play nicely and I'll show you how the doctors play doctor."

"Yes, ma'am."

xx

Ziva David steps into the Acapulco, unaware that her desire to avoid the Riviera is duplicated by most of her team and friends. She's indulged this evening in a royal blue replica of a dress she'd worn only once before, and this while under cover in another lounge far away. Then she'd portrayed a Singer performing an enticing rendition in English and French of 'Temptation', a torch song in no way subtle in promise or intent, for her target and anyone remotely interested.

She thinks briefly of doing the same performance here, but it would likely inspire Captain Stubing to order her thrown overboard. Either that or she would have her choice of far too many potential dates for the evening.

The long dress does come down to her ankles, and the blue is attractively highlighted by the multicolored beams of light that reflect off slowly spinning orbs, but in front the décolletage makes its one daring offer before joining into a crystalline line that does little more that point to other treats.

The back is in no way as subtle, falling off her shoulders to plunge like a Hawaiian Cliff Diver deep toward her derrière.

The dress screams promise, and if she leans either forward or backward it'll fulfill those promises to some fortunate man or men - or women. But the one promise the silken dress makes to her is that she will not leave this Lounge alone.

x

"Good evening," a well practiced voice strokes her as Doctor Adam Bricker steps around her.

"Good evening, Doctor," she says with just enough emphasis to convey that it might be so.

"You look very beautiful."

It took only a moment, when she'd boarded with Gibbs and Abby, to get his measure. He has not disappointed her since. "I get the impression that you, sir, are a connoisseur of beauty."

"More particularly of feminine beauty."

"Indeed." She looks about at the dance floor and the bar and intimate tables. "Have you found any?"

"Indeed I have."

All right, not all that subtle for the opening gambit, but she supposes that when his opportunities last only the few days of the cruises it doesn't pay to go in for the long, slow hunt. And while a walking hunter can, over several days, eventually wear down the fleetest antelope, in times like this she prefers the spectacular attack and cataclysmic capture or conquest. And though the second time she'd seen him he was backing away from her and his own colleague, she won't hold that against him, not when there are so many other things she can hold there.

"And when you find such a beauty as peaks your interest?"

"I usually try to get to know the lady in question much better."

She considers for a moment playing coy in spite of her inclination but he's already read the 'come hither if you dare' message that the back of her dress has given him and she traces the very brief flickers of his eyes - he really is skilled - and finds that while his eyes did not betray him the nubs that press the front of her deep plunging dress outward have betrayed her.

She looks up into the tall man's eyes and gives him a very slow smile, decides that tonight she'll play completely against type. "Then I fear you are destined to be disappointed."

"Oh, I doubt that."

"It is true." She adds extra spice to that smile. "As any of my colleagues will vouch, I am no lady."

xx

At the bar on the fore end, blue jacketed Isaac Washington hands a pair of chilled glasses to a gentleman and turns to Burl 'Gopher' Smith. "I hadn't noticed."

"Come on, you haven't noticed that this entire ship is buzzing over this murder? When Julie booked 'Murder on the High Seas' I'll bet she never thought it would be real."

"Of course she didn't. But people are still finding ways to enjoy themselves, the drinks are still flowing and the tips are still coming in. As long as the customers are happy, I'm happy."

"Still, we don't know anything about how their investigation is going."

"You expected to?"

"Well, would be nice."

"I'm sure they're keeping the Captain informed. Us Lieutenants," he shrugs, "we'll hear what he decides to tell us."

"Look out there," Gopher points into the crowd.

Isaac leans onto the bar. "Ohhhh, yesss... Now she could take your mind off murder."

"I'm _talking_ about the Agent over there. DiNozzo, isn't it?" He looks back but Washington hasn't redirected his eyes.

"You look to your sights," he smiles into his budding plans, "and I'll look to mine."

"I'm going to ask him. What harm can it do?"

Isaac only nods, concentrating on rearranging the woman's brief dress to even better advantage.

xx

On another part of the dance floor, Jimmy and Michelle try to get into the dance but "Sweetheart," Michelle urges, not having to look up far in her high heels, "will you loosen up? It's like dancing with a statue."

She'd barely managed to talk him into a suit. She's wearing her silver dress which is designed to draw his attention from any other woman, not that she fears competition. Her silver chain and sterling Wicca/Christian circled star and cross gleam in the deep V against her chest even in the subdued light, particularly when hit by any of the colored laser lights.

"I'm trying, but I can't. You're Pr–"

" _Uh uh uh,_ nobody says the 'P' word." She feels like Michael Keaton in Beetlejuice but hopes she got through.

"But–"

"It's been a few _hours_. I can _work_ as a crime fighter in the Field through my second Trimester, and if you have any doubts I'll pin you to this floor in five seconds flat."

He considers the gown she wears and admits it would be an interesting picture but "No. No doubts. I just don't know why you don't want me to tell anyone."

"I want to tell them, but not here, not now. I want to tell them when and how I want. Now we agreed, you can tell Ducky and your friends, but the people here, my partners and my friends, I get to choose the where and the when."

"But why? This is the biggest thing since–"

"Mother McGee." She can see she's lost him. "Remember when that rumor went around that she was pregnant? We almost lost her."

"But this isn't a rumor."

"Jimmy, would you _please_ \- just - wait?"

Before he can answer there's a pretty blonde woman at their sides and it takes them a moment to recognize Barbara Copeland, not in the nurse's uniform she wore last night / early morning. In fact, she's wearing a very attractive yellow gown and the flower through her blonde hair over her left ear is of the same shade. "Excuse me. May I cut in?"

Mildly surprised, Michelle considers for a moment. They've never been asked this question, though admittedly they rarely get out to dance like this. But her husband and the nurse have been working on the Autopsy and she does seem safe. "I suppose so," she says, relinquishing her husband - for the moment.

When Barbara links with her and they dance away from the stunned man, there's not much opportunity for words.

x

Jimmy, left stranded on the floor, looks about for salvation while hoping he's not as conspicuous as he feels. But in the last lost turn he finds himself beside the McGees, and they _would_ be looking at him.

"Guess that doesn't happen very often," Tim quips.

"That doesn't happen at _all_." The only man standing still in the middle of the floor, speared by various colored beams that rotate about the room like target lasers, he now feels five times as conspicuous and ten times as lost.

"Timmy?"

McGee reads his wife's thought in her emerald eyes and gracefully bows out. Siobhan holds her hands out to the now even more deeply flustered man.

He does take the ravishing redhead in his arms, but as he tries to dance he can't break the fact that he's far more discomforted now than he'd been with 'Chelle.

xx

Tim arrives at the bar at the same moment as the Ship's Purser, who seems exceptionally subdued in comparison to how he's gotten to know the brash man since their first encounter.

Isaac turns to him. "Good evening, sir. What can I get you?"

"Not quite sure."

"I know what, how about a Hairy Hangover?"

He grins. Jeanne had told them about her encounter earlier today. "Sure."

As Isaac gathers the appropriate ingredients from the shelves behind him and under the bar, he looks to his glum shipmate. "Shot you down, didn't they?"

"In flames. Oh, they were polite, but I'm not going to get anything."

"What did you expect? They worked all day, it's time to relax." He won't reveal to the agent the embarrassing details of his partner's failure at the hands of _his_ partner.

"Julie could've gotten something," Gopher grouses.

"Julie can always get something."

Gopher looks about the room. "I haven't seen her in a while."

"It's a big ship," Isaac counsels while setting the drink down before its creator.

"I can't imagine where she is. It's not like her."

"Something wrong?" Tim asks. The drink is excellent, so he's feeling more sociable than when Shav had danced off on her reconciliation dance.

"Our Cruise Director's AWOL," Gopher says.

"These days we say UA, Unauthorized Absence."

"Well, whichever she is," Isaac says, "she'd better show her face before the Captain has to ask where she is."

"Aren't all the ballrooms in use?" Tim asks, expecting she'd be in one of the others. How much can be asked of one woman?

"And she's expected to be visible in all of them. He's a bear about this sort of thing."

"Seems like your boss and mine have plenty in common."

"Hey, Tim," a very saucy voice says from behind him.

x

He turns toward the familiar voice, but it's the totally unfamiliar body that makes his eyes virtually pop from their sockets.

It's Abby, no doubt about that, but the woman isn't wearing even a hint of black other than her elegantly styled hair. The white dress that catches the rotating colored mini-spots is perched on the edges of her shoulders and plunges to a depth that adds a new dimension to the word daring. If she shrugs wrong or even sneezes this will become a legendary cruise.

He looks down the affectionate dress, not sure he should trust his eyes which want to stroke her like the turning colored lasers, and finds it ends inches above her knees over high heels even whiter than the dress. It's more staggering on her than her years ago Halloween impersonation of Marilyn Monroe and brings him back with a crash to their days of hot passion since he'd come to Washington and until he'd made the mistake of wanting more. But this is not a flashback, it's a blinding flash.

"Haammmm ah hanmanah heeeeh."

"Do you like it?"

He shakes himself back to the ship. "Antimatter Abby?"

"Definitely matter," she assures him with a light fist bump to his shoulder.

"You look gorgeous," Gopher assures her.

"Thank you." She looks out onto the dance floor, her tone wistful. "I just can't get anyone to dance with me."

"I'll dance with you," the Purser offers but Tim puts the back of his hand to the uniformed chest.

"Stand down, Seadog. I've waited years for this moment."

x

"So," Abby says as they dance to the slow beat, Tim's glass left behind, "how is it I luck out getting you all to myself? Where's Siobhan?"

"She's dancing with Jimmy."

She looks around, wanting to see this, but can't find them. "Why?"

"Because Michelle's dancing with Barbara Copeland."

"Boy, Tim, you had the makings of a great mate swapping script right up to that end."

"Would've been something if she were dancing with Tony."

"I'd need my camera for that, but that would leave Jeanne with no one to fall back to."

"We definitely need Gibbs."

"Yeah, he's certainly not holding up his end."

As the music winds into a more intimate song Siobhan is back at his side. "May I cut in?" she asks Abby.

"No."

This surprises both McGees, but not as much as the dancing couple when Siobhan says "In that case," and links with each of them. They do manage a few bars of the tune before the absurdity of the situation breaks them apart.

"While you were saving Palmer from death by embarrassment," Tim asks, linking with his wife but not moving away from Abby yet, "did you get anything on what happened yesterday?"

"I did try," she admits.

" _And_?" Abby urges. She's been trying at breakfast, lunch, seems like all day.

"He promised her he wouldn't tell," she affirms and dances her husband away.

x

Abby, annoyed at being left behind on the floor - _where is Gibbs_? - doesn't know she's duplicating Jimmy's earlier dilemma and wouldn't care if she did. Instead she tries very hard to put on a pleasant smile mask as she turns to stalk off the dance floor. McGee's drink is probably sitting waiting for him at the bar and it'll serve him ri–

In her sharp turn she almost collides with Lieutenant Burl Smith. "Pardon me," he says. "May I have this dance?"

For a moment she's not sure. He's not Gibbs, but the last time they were together she did betray a confidence, and he has treated her fairly – far more so than she's done with him.

And if Gibbs is going to be his usual self and not show his face out of his cabin...

"Gopher, you can have all the dances tonight."

As they join and move among the couples she's pleased to find he's a very good dancer, even better than she is. She supposes she shouldn't be surprised at this; she expects it comes with the lifestyle. Work all day among bevies of bathing beauties and spend every evening on the dance floor; yes, she can see the appeal of this life.

"I was hoping to get together with you this evening."

"Really?" 'Did the first thirty five women turn you down, sir?'

"Of course. The most sensually alluring woman on this ship, how could I do anything but spend my days needing and my nights longing?"

She smothers a giggle - 'I do not giggle!' - so hard it nearly hurts. She smells nothing on his breath but "Mister, you are way over your limit. I'm having Isaac cut you off for the rest of this trip."

"I'm serious." She looks into his eyes and realizes - or is she drunk on nothing? - that he is. "You are the most exotic, captivating woman I can ever remember sailing on this ship."

A thousand replies collide and pile a kilometer high on her brain. All she can do is feel her eyes widen and her mouth fall open until she imagines she looks like Tony on Friday morning on the Reveal Stage. She shakes her head hard, debris flying in every direction to litter her mental landscape. "You really think so?"

"I've dreamed of that kiss a hundred times since last night."

'Oh my God.' That kiss had been a trick to get him to think with his little brain rather than his big one so she could gather clues, betray his trust and then make sure with her special lock on the door that there was no way he could seek fulfillment of her promises. "Gopher–"

"Abby, I know we're not long for this, I'm in Los Angeles, you're in Washington, but tonight, just this dance with the most beautiful, alluring, spectacular woman it has ever been my deep pleasure to spend a cruise with, that's all I can hope for and even more than I can ask."

She hugs him close, less for the sensuality of the dance as so he can't see her face. But being this close, she can't deny, is very nice.

No, it's not nice. The way his body moves along hers is... very … not … nice. It's...

"Gopher?" she whispers in his ear. A voice that sounds like hers whispers in her own ear and she tells it to go screw itself.

"Hmmmm?"

"I really do want to enjoy a few dances with you," she whispers, his body against her doing so much more than she'd tried to do to him, "but later on..."

"Yes?" he whispers back, barely heard over the music, his warm breath tickling her ear. It sends a thrill down all the way from her hair to her...

'He sounds so hopeful. I wanted him to think with his little brain that time, now I can't even think. No, that's not true; I can think but only with the teeny, tiny brain in my...'

She gets even closer to his ear, which puts all of her very close to him, and her whisper is as quiet as she can make it, as though anyone could possibly overhear her hopeful question.

"Do you still have that key to my cabin?"

xx

"Well, that was interesting," Tim says when they're out of range of Abby, who he'd seen on a turn hadn't been left alone in awkward discomfort for very long.

"More so than you think," Siobhan tells him. "Something is definitely happening with the Palmers."

"Something you can't talk about?" They'd been apart for hours, and though he'd been with Michelle in the Interviews he hadn't pressed. Worrisome though his partner's situation was, it's her business so he hadn't intruded. But Shav had been out with full run of the ship and so had Jimmy.

"No, it's not that. I've been taken into no confidence, there's no Sacramental Seal this time. I'm completely clueless."

"Yeah, right. You have the inside track on everyone in NCIS except Gibbs."

"No one has that."

"I always suspect Hollis Mann does."

"No bet. But I don't want to talk about that," she says, attention on the music.

"What do you want to talk about?"

She comes closer, pulls him closer, and in her high heels bringing her those last three inches she can touch her lips to his ear. "Oh, how much I love you, and you love me," the music swells over them and she sings with it, "so darling, save the last dance for me."

He pulls his head back far enough so he can see her. "Very cute. But it's early. This isn't the last dance."

She pulls him even closer and whispers, "It is if you'd like to get lucky tonight."

xxx

Monday morning dawns clear and crisp, with a single lonely cloud in the sky as the Pacific Princess sails south toward a ten o'clock docking at Puerto Vallarta.

At 0900 and once again in the McGees' double cabin, four Field Agents and four very interested parties confer on where they stand as they wait for Gibbs, uncharacteristically late, to join them. Interviews are midway through, enough to get some pretty clear ideas of the conditions that exist among the Hannibal Players and a significant discovery has been made this morning so now it's time to consolidate and review.

"Where the heck is he?" Tony asks, knowing the question to be hopelessly rhetorical.

"I haven't seen him since we broke up," Abby says, quite put out. She'd gotten dressed up in something she'd found in the ship's store so she might surprise him and get into some very nice dances. Granted she'd reduced McGee to wide eyed incoherence but it's not the same thing.

What she'd actually done all night she hides behind a grumpy mask; it is definitely nobody's business but that mask does require quite a bit of effort. In fact, it takes about as much effort this morning as walking does.

But how many hours until Gopher is off duty? She must find out.

"This is not like him," Ziva says, truly hating to state the obvious.

"Think he fell in?" Tony asks.

"I think the ocean would be scared to drown him," Michelle declares.

"Thanks for the vote of confidence, Palmer," Gibbs declares as he pushes open the door. "All reports of my passing are premature. What've you got?"

x

"Good morning to you too, boss. You are going to love this," Tony predicts.

"I'd better. We've lost a whole night and Wednesday's coming hard."

Abby looks away and several others also have difficulty meeting his eyes.

"Special Agent Kelman and her team," Ziva reports in carefully level tones, "have faxed the bank records for the Retirement Account at 1100 hours their time, an hour ago."

"They don't match anything on Hannigan's computer," McGee declares.

"What's the difference?" Gibbs asks.

"You say this is supposed to equal half the net salary of all of the Players?" Tony asks.

"Net, gross, whatever."

"Well, boss, either way this is low."

"How low?"

Tim tells them that "According to Hannigan's laptop, and she uses Excel rather than an Accounting program, there should be nearly $700,000, including compounded interest, in that Retirement Fund. The spreadsheets show that each month's Statements balance with what she had but that's not true."

"What does the bank have?" he asks Tony. If he doesn't get an answer this time...

The Senior Field Agent pulls a paper from his trouser pocket and unfolds it. "Chase Bank sent us the year of Statements we asked for in the Warrant but last month's shows a balance of $16,472.84."

Gibbs is impressed, can only admit that "Yeah, that's low."

"Half the salaries of nine people for their entire tenures minus retirement nest eggs paid out, about–"

Ziva draws from her jeans pocket and unfolds a handwritten paper. "$677,106, based upon first of the month deposits for the past year, projected backward over four more years, excluding interest. This is after the disbursement to the actor who resigned last August and assumes no changes in the deposit amount." She'd stayed awake after Bricker had left, inspired with a breakthrough.

"Somebody withdrew six hundred thousand?" 'And no one noticed?' he finishes silently, more impressed than he wants to be.

"If those monthly deposits represented the usual deposits over year to year amounts then I cannot account for $579,633.67 over the past five years. The potential lost interest to the account is still to be determined. Unlike Agent Kelman, I cannot do those calculations in my head."

"Close enough," Gibbs decides. When the numbers get that high, one or two point something percent can be ignored for now. A Forensic Accountant will have to go over all the records, but suffice it to say there are going to be eight very pissed off actors.

x

"The funds were siphoned in a large number of withdrawals for varied amounts over the twelve months just passed," Ziva continues. "Considering the year's starting balance, I would think there has been a steady drain on the account, possibly since its inception. And there is more about the account that is interesting," she announces.

"Rather than being set up as a Business Account," Tony says, "which many banks would require multiple signatories on for the customer's security, this is a Personal Savings account."

"Therefore no checks, no paper trail for someone to find," Gibbs concludes. He won't get into the matter of Taxes, that can come later, but for now he's willing to bet that there's been a great deal of Creative Accounting there too. "And the name on this account is?"

"Exactly," Ziva says. "'Mrs. Dale Hannigan' is the sole name on the account. Statements are sent to her home address rather than to the PO Box the Players maintain. She could make cash withdrawals or use any number of other ways to siphon the account."

"What about their other accounts?"

"We do not have those to compare yet," she admits. "The Warrant had been for the Nest Egg account."

"The computer records also show those accounts balance," McGee says, "and the grand total of their assets per the Excel files is well over a million. But given the discrepancies in that Nest Egg account, I have no reason to trust anything. The records on Hannigan's computer, which were marked as 'balanced' remember, don't show _any_ withdrawals beyond that single disbursement last August."

"Talk about cooking the books," Michelle mutters.

"You could serve a feast with those," DiNozzo says. "This is a way better motive than trunk crowded rooms."


	19. Poached Nest Egg

Chapter Nineteen  
Poached Nest Egg

"Why would Mrs. Hannigan embezzle from herself?" Jimmy asks, and Gibbs grants that the question bothers him too.

" _Can_ you embezzle from yourself?" Jeanne asks. Gibbs never wishes to give a long-winded answer and this one cannot be brief, so he looks to his Legal Specialist.

"If it's a dedicated account," Michelle declares, "you sure could. If the account exists, according to the Contracts the Players signed or in any other documentation, solely as a means of providing a Nest Egg for retiring and departing actors, withdrawals couldn't be made for any other purpose. Then again, an account with only one Authorized Signatory invites problems like this.

"But I would have to see the paperwork, the Contracts, the By-Laws which I hope they signed, before I can say this is more than a simple verbal promise 'yes, I will give you X amount when you retire from us'. If they have something in writing, they have grounds to sue her - her Estate rather - but if it's a verbal promise then it's not worth the paper it isn't written on."

"Five hundred seventy nine thousand is a whopping lot of change," DiNozzo says. "What would she do with it?"

"McGee, have Kelman get the whole five years, for this account and all the others they have. Palmer, another Affidavit. Let's get the complete picture."

She pulls out her smart phone, calls up the template for that so frequently demanded document.

x

"Errr, boss?"

"What is it, McGee?"

"Well, we're..."

"Spit it out."

"We're investigating this because there's no one else who can, but if we're going to commit Agency Resources on a case with no Navy or Marine connec–"

Gibbs' face is an inch from his own. "You check to see if Tate's a Navy dependent?"

"Er, no boss."

"Neither did I, so until we know she's not..."

"Kelman might not even ask," Tony says.

"But suppose she does. Can I lie convincingly?"

"I don't know, McGee. _Can_ you?"

"You do not have to lie," Ziva says.

"But–"

"You are following up on case details your Team Leader assigned you to investigate. And until we prove there is no connection at all, there is."

"The Hannigan Players perform all over the Country," Tony says. "How are we to know who they have contact with until we follow the money?"

"All right. All Right. I'm going."

x

"Before you do - DiNozzo, you have your computer?"

"What would I be doing with a computer when I'm not at work?"

Gibbs looks among the other agents, impatience growing with the silence.

"Jimmy brought his laptop," Michelle says. The glare the tall man gives her could sink the ship.

"McGee, you once accessed your desk computer from home. Set up Palmer's the same way."

"Wait a minute! That happens to be _my_ com–!" Gibbs' glare clamps a steel seal over his lips.

"Don't worry, Jimmy," Tim says, "I'll put it back exactly as it was before. Better in fact," he promises.

"Why can't you use yours?"

"Because McGee's is going to copy–"

"Mirror."

"Mirror Hannigan's and I need both things being done at once. DiNozzo, find out about the _real_ Players, and this time I don't want the Google garbage."

"Right, boss," he says. "You know, something's finally starting to make sense."

Two days deep into this Investigation, he wishes more things would. "Yeah, why Hannigan was so dead set on Tate never becoming their Business Manager."

xxx

.

Meredith Tate lies on her bed, the second full day of confinement in the Pacific Princess' Lido 123 before her. Since her confinement she'd seen nothing of Mazatlán beyond the view through her starboard facing porthole, and on the whole this cruise is far less than she'd imagined it would be. Now that they've cast off she has a good view of water.

The slightly swaying cabin is utterly boring, with her only visitors being the Stewards who bring her meals. Room Service is no treat at all when she can't leave her room. She's so utterly bored - rereading scripts is no fun when she can quote all the female roles - that she surprises herself by being happy when her door lock clicks off followed by one of the last voices she wants to hear.

"Ms. Tate? Special Agent Gibbs. Are you decent?"

"Are murder suspects ever decent?" she calls back.

The door swings open and she's glad she'd prepared for any potential company in pink halter and white shorts as soon as she'd showered.

"Good point. I usually think not."

She sits up, coming cross legged on the bed. "Tell me, Agent Gibbs, if I weren't, would you have come in?"

"I wouldn't stay."

"That's not an answer." Their eyes meet for many moments. "But I guess it's the best I'm going to get." Again no confirmation nor denial. "Okay, Agent, what can I do two you?"

"Two?"

"I'm only feeling half hospitable."

x

"Fair enough." He leaves the door wide open and it's only partially because she's a woman and he appears to be alone. David and Palmer stand in the passageway two cabin lengths in each direction, he having directed the guarding crewman to a place out of earshot. If she believes she's not being crowded, she may be less timid and this is not going to be an Interview but a fact checking.

He pulls the chair from before her bureau, sets it in line with the foot of the bed. "If you still want that Lawyer I can't talk to you, but we could solve a lot if I could."

"Isn't your being here at all against the rules?"

"If I thought you were guilty. I don't."

" _Hallelujah_. What made you change your mind?"

"Never made it up. But you were the perfect suspect. I don't like perfect suspects."

"Well, that's something. One thing I've never been is perfect." She thinks the matter over, says cautiously "I can still decide what I answer?"

"Yes."

She thinks for half a minute. "Okay, we'll try it. Ask."

"Who stands to gain from Dale Hannigan's death?"

"Well, we all, those who liked her and those who didn't, gain some peace and quiet with her gone. And Harry doesn't have to apologize for her wherever he goes. You may have seen him having to follow her about and trying to smooth ruffled feathers everywhere she goes. It's not that he wants the job, but if left to her mercy we'd all starve or have to get 9-5 jobs."

"But is there anyone you can think of who could actually benefit from Hannigan's death?"

She considers the point but "No one in particular, so far as I know, unless they're in her Will. But I have trouble seeing that bitch even leaving a Will, let alone putting any of us in it. Anyone but Stern, that is. _She_ probably has visions of taking over, assuming we even exist by the time we dock, but I'll be damned if I'll be part of the Stern Players. Name doesn't even sound good."

"Suppose you all decide to call it quits."

She considers this. He decides that this time it's for show. She's had a lot of time to think and she'd be very motivated on this subject. "If we do split up, I'm guessing the first thing to do will be to crack open the Nest Egg. Everybody's got a part in that, but if they try to rush any dissolution through before my anniversary I'll get a Lawyer and tie their hands until I'm eligible for my cut. That's only two and something weeks, anyhow."

x

Gibbs sits back, a mask of comfort. "Tell me about the Nest Egg."

She shrugs. "It's an account used to send off a Player who leaves us. It's made up from a cut of the Box Office receipts to equal half our gross pay."

"How much do you figure is in it?" he asks with carefully deceptive casualness.

"I don't know. We all get the same money, so if I were to guess it'd be..." sotto vocé "five years at double my half year for last year... times nine..." she decides with a conditional shrug upon "six seventy five, seven hundred thousand, give or take." She comes off her cross legged position, sits at the foot of the bed. "Some of them may even try to see that I don't see any of it."

"Why?"

"Well, if there are no more Players, the fund will likely be split among the others. I'm not saying everyone will take a hard line, but by the letter of the law I'm entitled to my cut only after August tenth. That's why I'd get a Lawyer to tie their hands until my Contract says I'm entitled to my cut."

"You think they'd cut you off?"

"Not all of them. Stern would, she and Hannigan were of the same mold. Harry would go to bat for me, Mike and Judy would, Erika would, Pete might and maybe Charlie but I'm not holding out for anything. I'm just laying here considering my options and thinking maybe Julie McCoy was right about needing a new gig."

"A lot of money to be had, split seven ways." He watches her thought at first about her being cut out, then to realize there's one member who's not going to have use for his or her money, other than possibly to hire a Lawyer. He wonders what their By-Laws might say about that.

x

"What if they don't break up?"

She shrugs. "I don't have a clue. You know, Hannigan's curse is still working. Everyone else is downstairs and on the other side of the ship. I can't even talk to them by rapping Morse Code on the walls."

"Do they know Morse Code?" Perhaps he should have applied Rule Number One more forcefully.

She shrugs. "You got me." She looks about the cabin. "Literally." She leans forward slightly. "Say, I know the door's open for all the PC issues; you're a big powerful man and I'm a helpless maiden alone and at your mercy." She winces at his look. "'Helpless maiden' sounds more elegant and evocative than 'defenseless woman', but what's to prevent me from making a dash for freedom?"

"Mother McGee would probably say 'it depends upon the kind of life you've lived'."

"True. Rather than running I'd probably sink like a brick." He gives her a noncommittal shrug and doesn't move to stop her when she stands up and crosses the room to the door. She looks back, sees he hasn't moved and leans out to look along the passageway. "Hi," she greets one captor pleasantly, looks in the opposite direction. "Hi." She returns to the bed and sits back down, legs crossed under her.

"How much of that is out of your next script?"

She grins. "Your Agent McGee would probably tell you the Writer's answer: all of it. I figure I did so badly alone on 'Murder on the High Seas' that anything I do next has to be better."

"Perhaps. Tell me about that account." From what he knows so far, that's a work of fiction several people are going to be anxious to read.

x

She leans back on her arms. "I never had access to any figures, but I can do a reasonable guesstimate at around six seventy five, seven hundred grand."

"What if I were to tell you there's a little more than sixteen thousand total?"

She jumps forward. " _What_?" She restrains herself, having nearly leaped from the bed. "Special Agent Gibbs, there is no _way_ that can be! I cleared seventeen point five grand last year after taxes for August through December. There's got to be a minimum of about eighteen point five, nineteen grand coming to me as half my twelve month net after I have to pay the tax on the gross I'll get and which I'm _entitled_ to come August eleventh. That's what I've been holding out for. The total for everyone, that has to be on the high side of six hundred grand, closer to seven hundred." She sits off the edge of the bed. "You're telling me there isn't even a hundred?"

"Sixteen and change."

She leaps to her feet. " _What The Fuck Happened To It_?"

Gibbs likes the out-of-control interviewees; they're transparent as glass.

x

"We're trying to find out."

"Damn, I never had reason to trust Hannigan's word, now I know I should've pushed harder. We always needed Checks and Balances; I said that over and over."

"What happened?"

"Nothing. 'I handle everything'; that's what she said, and that's what everybody agreed to. Fuck, _sixteen_ grand? Something like three quarters of a _Million_ shot to shit?"

"You said you tried to become the Business Manager?"

"This only proves they needed a real Manager, instead of that bitch Hannigan running the whole show. I _Majored_ in Business, I had a 3.93 GPA! _I have a freaking Master's Degree in Business Administration_! If I had _been_ the Manager this wouldn't have happened!"

"Pretty clear now why you weren't."

x

This takes the fire from her, and it's a moment before she admits "You're right." She sits down, remembering he prefers her seated. "What about the other money?"

"Hannigan's computer shows your Nest Egg has nearly seven hundred in it," her mental guesstimate had been pretty good, "and records every Statement as balanced. The Statements we subpoenaed disagree. We're getting a Warrant for all your accounts."

"Wasn't she making the deposits?"

"That's the interesting thing; she was, but she was also making steady withdrawals."

"Wait, who's the second Signatory?"

"No one. There was only one signature required on the account - Hannigan's."

" _DAMN IT_!" might be heard on the Riviera deck as she leaps to her feet. "What the fuck Business Account has only one Authorized Signature?"

"It wasn't a Business Account, it was a Personal Savings."

" _DOUBLE DAMN IT_!" might startle Stubing on the bridge. "What kind of Idiots do I work with that the lot of them would let her get away with that? I'm blocked, they're _not_."

"Sit down."

She looks like she wants to refuse, but the blast of courage that came with outrage has drained from her and she sits down on the edge.

x

"If she were alive and tried to cut me to sixteen when I figure I'm due nineteen gross I'd sue her tent-size panties off."

"Pretty obvious now why she was trying to force you out ahead of time."

"I may sue her Estate anyway." She heaves a massive sigh. "Boy, when this summer's over Pete is really gonna be pissed."

"How so?" He expects there will be a lot of pissed people. Out of the eight survivors, sixteen thousand won't even cover Tate and her one year pittance.

"Well, if we are breaking up I can only claim nineteen, give or take, but it won't touch any of the others. But even if we don't break up, come Labor Day when Pete retires he's going to want his full cut and that comes over a hundred, not counting his Investment dividends." She collapses back onto the bed and tells the overhead "This is really messed up."

"Peter Finch? He says he's not planning to retire."

She picks her head up to look down to him. "That's not true."

"It's not?"

She sits back up. "Noooo. He's been talking about it for months. He's seeing us through the Summer, but come Labor Day he turns seventy and he's retiring. And he's worked out exactly how much he has to look forward to. When he does retire in September he's moving to Bermuda and he's been saying for weeks 'hot sun, hot sand, hot women and one hundred eighty big ones to enjoy them with'."

xxx

Down the passageway with Ziva and Michelle, as the white and black uniformed crewman returns to his watch, Gibbs says "Palmer, you sent those Affidavits?"

"Of course, sir."

"Go to the Business Office and call Kelman, then wait on those faxes and bring them straight to McGee. I want to know how bad Hannigan's bookkeeping was."

"Rather than using an Accounting program, which would spot discrepancies," Michelle reminds him, "Hannigan used a simple Excel Spreadsheet program, so nothing she entered had to look anything like the Statements."

"Ziva, go to Abby, have her get those fingerprints out. I want to know if anyone other than Hannigan had access to her laptop or to the real Statements."

"Do you believe someone discovered the truth?"

"Any of them would have a motive _if_ that's why she was killed. Right now we have a motive and it fits everyone."

"Only Finch and McCabe mentioned the account," Ziva reminds him.

"Which also raises 'why didn't the others?' Maybe one of them knew. If they're breaking up, they're all going to want their cuts. You two get on your jobs, I'll see what McGee and DiNozzo have dug up."


	20. Do You Trust Your Wife?

Chapter Twenty  
Do You Trust Your Wife?

Julie McCoy stands with Siobhan McGee at the entrance to the Coral Lounge and scans the room. To ensure proper utilization of the rooms, passengers are scheduled for meals at specific times and places, so it's very easy for the Director to find her targets. "There they are, table twenty seven."

"Thank you." The priest descends the steps and crosses the room to a young couple seated at a table of six. "Excuse me."

Mary Clark and Joseph Wagner look up to the woman standing between and slightly behind them, each feeling slightly discomforted. They'd met only once and that encounter hadn't gone well. It was an embarrassing occasion and they have little hope that this one, situated in public among strangers, will be much better. "Yes, Reverend?" Mary says, her tone distant and impersonal.

"I'm sorry to interrupt," she tells the couple and their four lunch companions, "but this will take only a moment." She focuses upon the pair. "I've made calls to the Roman Bishop of the Diocese of Los Angeles, and to a Church he recommended." She hands Joseph a folded paper. "I spoke to Father Derek Springer and explained your situation. After we dock he will see you and resolve that matter." She gestures to the paper. "All the particulars are there. If you wish, the crew can arrange a ship-to-shore call for you."

She enjoys their stunned expressions almost as much as their wildly enthusiastic hugs and boisterous demonstrations of gratitude.

xx

Tim McGee closes and rubs his eyes, trying to get the numbers and letters on the screen to stop swimming when the door to Promenade 238 swings open and Gibbs enters. "McGee, can you tell if anyone beside Hannigan used her computer to look at bank records?"

Turning from his laptop, he's of a mind to point out how little this cabin resembles his bullpen cubicle. What if Shav were here? With a newlywed's intent to get him interested in things other than 'Enkiss', she's occasionally less than clothed in here when she's trying to break his last tie with the work. On Saturday, distracted herself, she'd switched from bikini to nothing and finally dressed in front of him, her mind so on problems rather than conjugal relations that she'd been completely unaware of the effect her display had had on him.

He decides, however, that there's little point in raising the issue. He expects that if the man walked in on an inappropriate moment - from now on that door stays locked 24 hours a day - he'd pull the discussion into the passageway.

"It may be possible, boss. Why?"

"The financial records. What if someone saw the real ones?"

"Well, you happen to be in luck. The laptop is in the Purser's vault–"

"It's _Evidence_ , McGee."

"The vault is Safe Deposit boxes, boss. I have the other key."

"Okay."

"But this morning I found on the download of her drive – I copied only those files created or accessed in the past six months – that Hannigan did have an On-Line with Chase bank. The real Statements were downloaded to a password protected file. I guess she wanted to have them available even if she was faking everyone else out."

"You were able to break her password?"

"'Dale'."

x

When he'd hit upon it he'd wanted to say 'you kidding me?' but the two things that have been obvious about the woman since the Friday dinner, even beyond what he'd learned from Meredith Tate, are a sense of entitlement wrapped about a massive ego. The 'Hannigan Players' indeed.

"Can you tell if anyone got into those files?"

"Well, there are four good ways. The best would be if someone accessed the files and saved them, in which case I'd look for dated discrepancies in the FAT. Or Abby could check for fingerprints other than Hannigan's."

"Already on it."

"I'll of course need to get her laptop from the vault. If Abby can't isolate fingerprints I could look for failed attempts to break the password, that would be an obvious giveaway. I could also search for on-line hacks–"

"McGee?"

"Yes?"

"Just do it."

"Just doing it, boss."

Gibbs leaves, probably in search of less technical venues.

Next time he'll have to knock.

xxx

The Senior Field Agent had been assigned to learn about the real Players on Palmer's enhanced laptop, using resources available through NCIS' Searches rather than the public knowledge available on Google or the hype that fills their website. And Gibbs, regardless of how long he spent with Tate, feels justified in expecting a good report when he arrives down at Fiesta 105.

That a 'Do Not Disturb' sign hangs from the door handle is no part of his plan and doesn't affect it at all as he opens the barrier and pushes it aside.

"You _see_ , Tony? I _told_ you," Jeanne Benoit declares from the bed. Fortunately she's dressed and Tony is seated in a chair at the small desk at the right side of the room.

"She said you'd see the sign and walk in anyway."

"You're on the clock."

"That's good to know. I thought I was donating the time. Actually, this is supposed to be a vacation."

"Which you might get back to if you have anything."

"Vacation," he declares with a wave to the laptop screen, "here I come."

x

He has the pleasure of making a grand gesture to the laptop screen before him as he prepares to declare a major breakthrough in the Pacific Princess Murder Case to his boss, who came in with all systems set and locked on Impatient.

"The Hannigan Players are centered in Miami, Florida, which I grant is a great hopping off place for any number of shipboard and hotel venues. They travel all over the country; east coast, west coast, heartland, wherever the Muse takes them. For Criminal records they're positively boring, two of them are so clean you could use them as organic disinfectants. I'd compare them to McGee except for the time he got pinched breaking into an Police Impound Yard."

"Your mug shot's next to his, DiNozzo."

"True, but I photograph better." He considers the machine before him. "You know, it's pretty convenient having our office Apps away from the office. I'd keep it on if it was my machine."

Gibbs puts his hand on the man's shoulder and leans in close. "I didn't get a lot of sleep last night, and you're flirting with Excedrin Headache 666."

x

Figures Gibbs would know the antique commercials. "As I said, no Records on any of them but when I started tracking Real Estate, 'follow the money' got very interesting. The nine of them are - were in Hannigan's case - living in modest means; three have houses owned jointly with spouses or, in one case, a very good friend of the same gender persuasion; the rest have apartments scattered throughout Miami, until you get to Hannigan. She has a second residence in Madagascar my dad would envy and he's never gone wanting for much."

"Well, yeah, DiNozzo, in their economy you'd be a billionaire there."

"Three quarters of a million, she could be Queen."

He calls up a photo of the property and Gibbs sees reason for envy. "It was bought as a distressed Estate. She could make it a palace."

"And we have no Extradition Treaty."

"I was just about to get into the on-line records for their other accounts but I think we're going to find out she's been fleecing her sheep for years out of more than their retirements."

"Peter Finch is retiring Labor Day and he expects to walk off with a hundred eighty out of that sixteen."

"I'm thinking that's a good reason for her to force Tate out before her anniversary next month, because if she didn't pay someone would get suspicious. But either way, come September those people were going to wake up and find themselves holding an empty sack." He turns to the computer, flexes his fingers. "Care to take a stroll through Wonderland?"

"Call it up. Then I want to take another look at the Crime Scene photos."

"Sure, they're in the Gremlin's Dropbox. Both their phones download automatically."

xxx

Abby Sciuto ran into Gopher in an empty passageway and had lost quite a few mood enhancing minutes in the encounter. She's wearing her black tee shirt with white rib cage and red heart and had read in his eyes that he'd really wanted to explore her inner workings, but before he could get past her ribs she'd received a text through Ziva from Gibbs to collect some supplies and bring them to McGee's cabin. Shopping for said supplies had taken some time but eventually she knocks on the door of Promenade 238. A few moments later it's unlocked and Siobhan opens it. She's wearing red scoop necked shirt that hints at much from the right angle and blue stretch pants that stroke her legs but

"Ooops, I'm not interrupting anything, am I?"

"No. Timmy insists the door be kept locked now until the case is solved."

" _Really_? Catching up on Honeymoon part two?"

"Three," Siobhan says, stepping aside. When she enters, Abby sees something's missing.

"Where's Tim?"

Siobhan pouts. "He left me. He's with the Purser."

"That man needs _help_." She'd been with Gopher before starting her hunt and _he_ had gotten all the help she could give him in a passageway.

"Tell me about it," she quips as she closes and relocks the door. Then she reads the question in the scientist's eyes. "On Saturday, before that midnight meeting, Timmy came back just as Captain Stubing was leaving after asking me to conduct the Memorial Service. That was about twenty minutes to midnight and Timmy got the totally wrong idea, something about the Captain and Purser having passkeys."

"Oh, yeah." She knows Gopher's key situation all too well. She'd gone very discreetly to her cabin last night but hadn't been alone for more than a minute. She'd only lowered the zipper at the back of her white dress when he'd come to help.

"Then a short while ago Jethro walked in here unexpectedly. I was in the Coral Lounge so there was no danger of over exposure."

"Gibbs wouldn't do that. I mean he might, but he'd leave quickly." She remembers his talking to the passageway when she'd hidden behind her door in her birthday suit after receiving her present from one of the other guests. "And the Captain coming to see you was totally innocent."

"Yes it was, and Jethro does get fixated on a case over and above the social niceties but of course he wouldn't walk in on me and stay if I weren't dressed. But when I got back from the Lounge Timmy was so mad about what _might_ have happened, like I'd be modeling my birthday suit when either of them visited," Abby can't restrain a smile, having done quite a bit of modeling of her tattoos last night - and very nearly this morning.

"Now he absolutely insists the door stay locked all the time. He was so aggravated I thought it best that I be a good wife and love, honor and obey."

"I could never take that."

"Your Vows are going to be more like adore and freak out."

"Totally."

x

"What do you have there?" Siobhan asks, gesturing to the plastic bag in her hand.

"Part two of Old School Fingerprinting, courtesy of the Princess; powder puff, make-up kit and some other things." Part one on Friday had been running a number two pencil over paper, having the subjects run their fingers back and forth over the graphite mark, then lifting the image with Scotch tape and pressing those images onto labeled index cards.

She got dry transfer images better than many inked samples she'd often been forced to interpret. One Company, a Security company of all things, thought it was acceptable to roll fingers with five pounds of pressure and provide cards full of black rectangles.

Now comes the next phase of Girl Scout Forensics.

**-*-**** comes from the door.

Siobhan glares at it. "I do believe I shall hit him."

"What was that?"

"We use it for our doorbell at home because we're four stories up with no intercom. This way I know it's he who comes in late at night or some really unexpected hour. He'll let me know it's him coming so I don't jump when the door opens."

"Why should you–? Oh." She'd been kidnapped by Charles Morley after walking into her Rectory bedroom.

"I still jump sometimes. If Timmy comes in late at night he warns me."

"Hell."

"It's a good safety thing because I won't buzz anyone in at that hour, but we _don't_ need it here," she finishes, stalking toward the door.

Abby puts her hand out to block her advance. "I've got a better idea." She hands her the plastic bag and a quick tug pulls her black tee shirt up over her head and off. Siobhan is too shocked to be outraged in time at the bra-less display.

Abby unlocks and pulls the door wide and says so quickly the words crowd her tongue "Sorry, McGee, wrong pass code." She closes the door even more quickly and relocks it.

x

" _Abby_!" is all Siobhan can whisper, appalled as Abby restores her tee shirt.

"ABBY!" comes through the door and it's not appalled, it's angry. A few seconds later the key fumbles, then turns in the cylinder and the door flies open again. "What the He–?"

"Do you trust your wife?" Abby demands, her voice so hard she slams back whatever he was going to say.

"Wha–?"

"Do you _Trust_ your _Wife_?"

He forgets the plastic wrapped laptop tucked under his arm and has to catch it. Only then can he declare "Of course I trust Shav." He turns to his wife. "Of course I trust you."

"Then no more _nonsense_! No more locking the door against team mates, no thinking she'd be unfaithful to you with a man _she just met_ , no locking her in and _no stupid pass code knocks_!"

x

"Abby, are you all right?"

She wants to insist 'yes', but "No," comes out hard together with a tear she must wipe away lest either see it. Her breath is fractured and it's not from that diatribe. Siobhan steps closer but she backs away, for if her friend hugs her she's going to cry. She realizes a good night was no solution.

"Abs?" Tim tries.

"This is all wrong! We're trying to relax so we don't get fired _and I did not fail my evaluation_ but I'm standing here about to powder puff a laptop to raise prints when I should be on the Lido deck with Ziva sending our halves of the ship into testosterone overdose and I haven't slept all weekend and _you_ think because the Captain came about a Service that he was screwing your wife and _you_ had to do a Memorial Service on your vacation and _you're_ locking your wife under a rock because of an innocent request and because Gibbs is being Gibbs and Michelle's had some kind of wild seizure and fainted and won't admit _why_ and Jeanne's ready to brain Tony and we missed Mazatlán and I haven't slept since Friday and every time I see Michelle on our time off she's with the _Nurse_ and it's scaring the Hell out of me and I'm standing here ranting to my friends because first Jimmy and Michelle aren't solving a damn thing and their marriage is going to _Hell_ and nothing can stop it and she has a seizure and faints and no doctor knows why or will talk about it because of _Stupid_ HIPPA laws and then Tony and Jeanne are I don't know what and now you two and I'm seeing the whole lot of us falling to pieces and I haven't seen Gibbs anywhere after sundowns and I don't know what's going on and- and- and-."

This time Siobhan doesn't let her pull away, and then Tim sandwiches her between them while she cries.


	21. You Are Cordially Invited

Chapter Twenty One  
You Are Cordially Invited

"If ever there were a motive," Tony DiNozzo muses while Gibbs behind his left side and Jeanne looking over his right read the third of a set of On-Line Chase Bank Statements. The Passwords had been horrendously simple to guess. 'Dale' had opened the first, 'Hannigan' the second and 'DaleHannigan' the third. Jeanne had referred to a Brobdingnagian ego, but Tony thought his darling thought too small.

Counting the famous 'Nest Egg' the Hannigan Players float four accounts; the others are a general Savings, a Checking and a Business Money Market and of the four the Nest is the wealthiest. It has over sixteen thousand while the others range from ten to fifteen thousand each. Regardless of activity, no account has shown a significant net increase or decrease in any month for as far back as they can go, and even the check for this Cruise's three performances barely spent enough time in the bank to Clear.

"Good thing these guys work from homes," DiNozzo says, "because if they had an office they'd only cover August's rent."

"She'd been keeping them floating in a rowboat," Gibbs concludes, "because when she skips town they'll be paupers before they notice she's gone."

"So," Jeanne says, "they've got about fifty four thousand and change out of what should be _way_ over a million. Who did that piss off?"

xxx

Gibbs has received Abby's fingerprint report and photos. Now he unlocks and knocks at the door to the Lido 123 Holding Cell, then inquires as to Meredith Tate's state of dress, a courtesy that annoys Tony and Tim since it hadn't been extended to either of their ladies.

"Come in," she calls through the wood. Gibbs opens it and leads his full team within. "Hi Tim," she greets her only friend in the group.

"Hello."

Gibbs closes the door, snaps the seal, turns to her. "Quick, where's Madagascar?"

Expecting another Interrogation question about the Players, the murder or some similar subject, she can only return a blank stare. She then looks down and it's evident that she tries, but after several seconds is forced to look back up to him and admit "I don't know."

"Try again."

She appears to rack her mind, finally a vague guess. "South Pacific?"

"Don't feel bad," Tony advises. "Lots of Americans can't find Rhode Island. They look for an island off the east coast."

"No, I've been there, lovely seafood, but what's with the geography quiz? You run out of real questions?"

"Never," Gibbs assures her.

"It is a set of four islands," Ziva says, "off the east coast of southern Africa."

"Home to the most diverse ecosystem on the planet," Tony tells her. "Species of wildlife include the rotund Hannigan."

"Huh?"

"Hannigan bought and outfitted an Estate," Gibbs tells her, "where she not only socked away the three quarters of a million from your Retirement Fund but everything short of forty thousand or so from your three business accounts."

" _WHAT_?"

Tony decides to present it more directly. "I'll make this short and not at all sweet," he says, quoting Jennifer Shepherd. "You guys are broke."

x

They watch her face fall and fall further. "We have... We've been... We get ten _thousand_ per gig plus expenses! We did thirty seven plays since I've been with–. That's..."

"You're broke," Gibbs uses the sledgehammer between her eyes. "Including your Retirement Account you have," he consults a paper, "fifty four thousand, two hundred seventeen dollars and thirty eight cents to split among the eight of you."

x

He lets her absorb this, and then "Who had access to the bank records?"

"Agent Gibbs, if you remember my conniption from before you know Dale 'we made a nice profit this year' Hannigan kept all the books. I was the only one who said 'we should have an Accountant and an Investment Plan', but everyone trusted Hannigan. She was full of rosy stories of how much we were making, and whenever anyone needed anything - anybody but me, of course - the money was always there."

"She kept a little bit in each account to make it look like you were solvent. In the end of June you had your sixteen thousand dollar Nest Egg plus thirty seven thousand, seven hundred forty four dollars and fifty four cents split among the other three accounts."

"Like a roll of cash you pull out of your pocket but only the outer bills are real money?"

"You got it," Tony confirms. "And if as you say one of you is going to retire, then on a day not much before that she was planning to drop you guys to zero and vamoose."

She looks among the five Agents. "Would you think any less of me if I had a major temper tantrum right now?"

"I'd prefer," Gibbs counters, "that you do your acting on the stage."

Tony grins. "How are you at Improv?"

xxx

Captain Merrill Stubing's office on the Sun deck is a very large and elegantly appointed three rooms, the whole consisting of his home and headquarters, the decor befitting the Master of a Luxury Liner. The wood lined section behind his desk could stand for any land based Corporation's CEO's headquarters and it is to this elegant site that the NCIS Agents, working guests on his ship, have deposited one at a time into his care his other working guests.

When seven of them are present but the conveying men and women are not, white haired Peter Finch turns to the Shipmaster. "What is going on?"

"Sir, I suspect you know more than I do. The NCIS Agents asked me to host this meeting but they have been rather stingy with explanations. We'll have to wait."

This is a bald faced lie, which is why he considers it appropriate that he should deliver it. Since yesterday Special Agents Gibbs and DiNozzo have been very accommodating with explanations, which is why he has a four person Security team standing by at the intersection of the passageway where they will remain out of sight until the last player in this drama has taken the stage.

x

As though on cue his door opens to admit three men and three women, the NCIS Agents and Meredith Tate, who halts and looks utterly terrified to face her assembled colleagues. She wears black sneakers, white shorts, pink halter and silver handcuffs.

"What is this?" Harold McCabe's outrage at the small woman's treatment packs the room.

"Please!" Meredith whispers, her plea so tiny it can barely be heard. "Help me. Don't let them do this."

"Are those really necessary?" Michael Simmons also protests.

DiNozzo, ignoring the outrage as other voices join into a cacophonous clamor, slides a laptop computer out of a clear plastic bag onto Stubing's desk.

Gibbs handles a manila envelope, 9 by 12, the only other thing carried into the room.

 _"Please._ " Meredith appeals somewhat more loudly. "Someone help me." She tries to step forward, Michelle and Ziva each grab an arm and tug her back.

"Captain," Gibbs says, "we've identified Dale Hannigan's killer, and since the crime took place in Mexican waters we ask you to contact the authorities in Puerto Vallarta."

"She couldn't have done it," Judy Paulsen declares.

"Of course she did!" Ann Stern counters. "I knew it all along."

"I'm afraid you're right," Peter Finch says. "It was obvious."

"Please don't," Meredith begs, restrained on each side by the women.

"Very obvious," Gibbs confirms and looks to the laptop on Stubing's desk. "It's all on that screen. Mister Finch, if you please?"

"Gladly."

"No! Please. I didn't do it. Please - someone _believe_ me."

x

"Don't worry, honey," Harry McCabe urges. "We'll see you get a good Lawyer."

"Yes, we will," Charles Maxwell declares.

"We have all the money we need to beat this," Erica King affirms.

"We'll do nothing of the kind!" Ann Stern snaps and turns on the frightened girl. "Bitch! They'll electrocute you for this and I'll throw the switch!"

"Who the Hell do you think you are?" King challenges. "It's our money, and if we want to use it to defend someone who's obviously innocent–"

Judy Paulsen appears at King's side. "Then that's what we're going to do."

"You will not!" Stern bites, her face red. "You forget that with Dale gone _I_ am President of the Players and I say–!"

"Go to Hell!" Maxwell commands. "No one made you boss."

"According to the By Laws–!"

"Mister Finch," Gibbs cuts in, the manila envelope open in his hand, "we're waiting."

"Of course."

x

Finch raises the lid an inch, reaches in with his thumb, his other four fingers on top and he raises the lid.

" _STOP_."

Gibbs' command is so sharp that Finch freezes as though a viper were about to bite.

"That's an unusual way of opening a laptop," Tony says.

The screen on the awoken computer shows a large photograph, but no one can distinguish it because the lid's not high enough for the image to be clear. "Oh. Is it?"

"Yes, it is. Most people avoid touching the screen. I'm told you can mess it up with finger oils."

"So?"

"The same oils that are treated to raise fingerprints. Did you know that, when dusting stolen cars for prints, an Investigator doesn't go for the wheel? Everyone touches that and everyone messes it up. But when you drive a car that's not yours, the one thing a driver touches is the rear view mirror, and we usually get very good prints off that."

"Well? What does that have to do with–?"

Gibbs slides a picture out of the envelope. The edge and keyboard of the laptop are white with scores of images, but up near the top of the screen is a single clear print.

"This is Dale Hannigan's laptop. _That_ one belongs to my Deputy Medical Examiner. Oh, and see that print?" He points to the image, then holds the photo so everyone in the room can see the damning image. "That's yours."

Over the sound of McGee unlocking the cuffs from Meredith Tate's wrists, Gibbs continues. "On this ship, keys with matching final digits open all the corresponding guest's doors. It's fairly common for ships, hotels and so forth to have a system of some kind to use in emergencies. That way officers need carry only ten keys instead of hundreds.

"I don't know why you were trying to get in, what made you concerned that you might not get what was coming to you, but you looked for a way to see the records. You probably looked for a long time. But you found out that, on this ship, your key unlocked Hannigan's door and for the first time in a while you had access to her computer."

"You can't prove I ever went in there."

"You should have kept up with the times. That fingerprint thingy on her doorknob, on her suitcase, on her dresser drawer where you found the computer. But by the time our Forensic Scientist took your prints she already had your key that opened Hannigan's cabin and you were under guard.

"Sometime after boarding you went into her cabin, probably while she was cutting a swath through this ship with McCabe as apologist, and you snuck a peek at exactly how much you were getting in the beginning of September. It's not unreasonable considering Hannigan's accounting methods. The passwords she used for her on-line records - how did you describe them, McGee?"

"Staggeringly pathetic, boss."

"Yes, they were."

"I'm not saying anything."

"You don't have to, not to us." He displays again the photo of Hannigan's laptop screen. "I don't know how often or for how long you've tried to get her records, but on this ship you finally got to them. I'm guessing you're familiar with how ships duplicate locks to cut down the number of keys the crew needs. It must have been a shock when you used her computer to check on your famous Nest Egg and discover the account nearly empty. Must have made you really mad."

No one pays attention to McGee at the laptop or his whispered conversation with Stubing.

"Empty?" McCabe demands.

"What do you mean 'empty'?" Simmons is as loud. Gibbs nods to Tate, lets her take it.

x

"Hannigan has been bilking us for years, likely since day one. All our assets together, all four accounts, come to only _fifty thousand dollars_. I kept saying we needed Independent Accounting, Checks and Balances, an Investment Strategy, Transparency and someone who knows Business Management. Did anyone listen? It was obvious why she wouldn't let that happen. She bilked us out of nearly _a million and a half_ dollars. It's gone!"

"It must have been a shock," Gibbs presses Finch, "for you to look at the bank statements, having planned on over a hundred eighty thousand dollars, to find she left the lot of you together with only sixteen, and to realize even that would be gone before the summer's over.

"But I think you suspected something, that there was some clue that she was double dealing you or I doubt you'd have had a duplicate knife and, when an opportunity came up and you had someone to frame, you used it. You might have decided to kill her elsewhere until you got the script on Friday night that said the lights would be off. I don't need to know. Miami PD can figure out those details."

x

"Even if the money was gone and you think I had a motive, which I didn't, that doesn't say I killed her."

"Not alone, no." He looks to Tim hunched down over Palmer's laptop. "You ready, McGee?"

"Ready, boss."

"I remember," Gibbs tells Finch, "how broken up you seemed when Hannigan died. But you're actors, you guys can make anything you want to be seem to be. But we're Investigators, we don't deal with what seems to be, only with what is. McGee?"

x

On the wall mounted plasma screen to their right appears the photo taken by Michelle Palmer's cell phone camera of the confused moments following the murder. All seven survivors other than Tate had gathered in an irregular cluster on the far side of the round table but Finch, King, Simmons and Paulsen stand together. Finch's hands are red from when he'd handled the body, clutching it and turning it over.

"Are you going to say I'm guilty because I have blood on my hands? Spare us the tired cliché."

"No, not blood on your hands, a different showman's cliché." The image enlarges, centers on Finch's upraised left wrist, his hand hovering near his bow tie. "It's what's up your sleeve."

x

Running along the ulnal side of his hand and wrist, rather than the flow toward fingers as would happen if the blood had been on his left hand solely from when he'd handled the corpse, a wide red trail of blood had flowed from white cuff upward until it's hidden by the black tuxedo sleeve.

"When you came up behind Hannigan you grabbed her throat with your left hand, slit with your right, but before you cut into her right carotid for the spray to bathe Tate, the flow ran along your hand and wrist and up your shirt sleeve.

"When the lights came on and you realized you had blood on your hand you had to explain it away. That's why you made your grief stricken grab."

x

There's a knock at the door; Gibbs nods to Ziva and she opens it. Abby enters, a clear plastic draw string laundry bag in her hand and white cloth within the bag. She'd run into Gopher below decks, nearly lost track of time but broke away at the right moment, though she'd had to make sure all her buttons were in order before knocking. "Did I miss everything?"

"No, Abs, you're right on time," Gibbs assures her and takes the bag and turns it over. He allows everyone to see that there's a nine inch long trail of dried maroon blood as wide as half the sleeve and heading from cuff toward the elbow fold. "DiNozzo."

Tim steps across the room and passes the handcuffs he'd removed from Tate's wrists to his partner, who latches them on the old man as he says: "Peter Finch, you are under arrest for the murder of Dale Hannigan. You have the right to remain silent. If you give up the right..."

As Tony continues the recitation Gibbs notes that this time there's no clamor for lawyers or innocence, but a glance at the assembled parties reveals two overwhelming concerns. From the Players he reads an intent for recovery - if at all possible - of whatever might be left of the Acting Troupe and, from his people, the awareness that they still have two days left to their vacation.


	22. It's An Open Smile On A Friendly Shore

Chapter Twenty Two  
It's An Open Smile On A Friendly Shore

The Pacific Princess docks in the Port of Los Angeles on Wednesday evening, July 25 and hundreds of people say their farewells to one another throughout the vessel.

For Merrill and Vicki Stubing, Adam Bricker, Isaac Washington, Burl Smith and Julie McCoy these moments are usually bittersweet. They frequently establish friendships during these week long events, some last and most do not, but for six days they have glimpses into uncounted lives and these moments of departure never come but they are touched in unexpected ways, often briefly, occasionally forever.

"Oh, Miss McCoy," Stubing says to his Cruise Director as the group assembles in the Purser's Lobby to say farewell to their soon departing guests, "I dropped by your cabin early this morning, I had some papers that required your signature but you weren't in."

"Oh, I'm sorry, sir, I haven't been making much use of my cabin on this voyage."

A declaration like this cannot fail to garner interest. "Where've you been?" Gopher asks with a tone heavy on speculative lechery.

"Oh, around," she assures them with a growing smile. "And about."

"It sounds," Adam Bricker says, "like Julie's met a young fella with a warmer cabin."

"Mmmmmm, you could say that."

"And managed to keep it secret," Washington says.

"It wasn't easy," she admits with a smile that says she'd had a great deal of fun trying.

x

But before anyone can say more the departing guests come out of the passageway doors, off the elevator or down the curved stairwell and it's time to start saying goodbyes. The vast majority of passengers simply depart by the very obvious exit but one young couple approaches the officers.

"Captain, ladies and gentlemen," Joseph Wagner says, "we'd like to thank you for an interesting cruise."

"I'm sorry things couldn't work out," Stubing says.

"But they did," Mary Clark assures them. "The wedding's already arranged for this evening."

"I don't understand," Stubing confesses.

"Mother McGee, she set up everything. The other day she made some calls and arranged to get us married at a Church in the city."

"Oh. Congratulations."

"Thank you," Wagner says as he accepts a folded ticket holder from Gopher. "I already booked the reservation for your very next trip on Friday, same cabin."

Mary's surprised and enthusiastic response leaves no doubt that that next cruise will be much more pleasant.

x

Moments later another six passengers seek the group out, their luggage on numerous carts. "Well, my friends," former detective Charles Maxwell says, "one of our most interesting bookings."

"Also our shortest," Erika King says. "A quarter of one performance."

"And two sets of vignettes," Charles Maxwell 'reminds' her.

"We do appreciate your performances Monday evening and this morning," Stubing says. The group had performed excerpts from several of their plays, including a love scene between Tate and Simmons, the individual scenes allowing the troupe to use an abbreviated cast.

"Not at all. It was fun and a way to set us off." 'Murder on the High Seas' had required a cast of nine. This was a way to showcase talents and give the passengers at least some of the promised entertainment.

x

"I just hope it's not the last for the Hannigan Players," Bricker says.

"Actually," Harold McCabe says, "that set is the end. Was the end."

"I'm sorry to hear that," Isaac says.

"Yes," Vicki seconds. "You were good."

"Were good, young lady?" Judy Paulsen asks archly. " _Were_ good?"

"I'm sorry!" She looks as though she'd like to swallow her tongue.

"The Hannigan Players are formally dissolved," Michael Simmons announces. "We felt, in light of everything, that it was a dishonorable sobriquet."

"So in honor of our friends here," Erica King proclaims, "say hello to 'The Pacific Players'. Even though we'll still be in Miami, of course."

"We're honored," Stubing says, to which his primary crew adds their enthusiastic seconds. "We look forward to your returning again."

"We're going to have to," Harold McCabe admits. "We have an outstanding and unfulfilled Contract we simply cannot afford to default upon. Very bad for business to default on a paid gig."

"Anytime you wish, you're more than welcome."

"We had a Reorganization Session on Monday," McCabe tells them. "Most of the day it seemed, once we absorbed everything that'd happened to us. I've been elected President, immediately following which Ann quit."

"Ms. Stern resigned?" Gopher asks, quite surprised.

"There were some difficulties as the election got underway." Stubing, witness to the battle in his office, needs no explanations. "Now with her and Pete gone we're down three Players and all our existing scripts utilize nine, but we'll be organized and at full strength soon."

"I'm sure you will be."

"But before then," King declares, "since we're all Writers, one of the things we'll do is rewrite those By-Laws into something that makes sense."

"Amen," Maxwell says.

x

"Now as to Bookings," McCabe says, "I've made my first Presidential Appointment, so you'll have to take the dates up with our Business Manager," he cocks his thumb toward Meredith Tate.

"Well, congratulations."

"Thank you. And my first jobs are to put us on firm and _transparent_ financial footing. We have several booked gigs that haven't been paid for so we'll be solvent again soon. And I've already called a Lawyer; we're suing Hannigan's Estate for the money she embezzled. We'll be back on our feet again real soon."

"I'm sure you'll all be a great success," Stubing says.

"That Degree is finally going to pay off, thanks to all of you."

"We did little. Thank them," the man says, seeing seven of the Navy Agents approach from the doors, led by their leader. Only Doctor and Agent Palmer are absent.

x

Tate's parting moments with the man she considers her savior are the most emphatic, but partings among the three groups are heartfelt. They'd come to mean a great deal to one another over the past week.

"So," Stubing says generally to the Agents and their guests, "shall I tell Jennifer that you got the rests you needed?"

"Absolutely," Tony says, his gaze taking in not only his own group but the Players. "We didn't come on this cruise to _stop_ working. I think we came to be reminded why we work. With us it's always 'case closed, bye, we're off to the next one'. It means something to be here for more than just the aftermath."

"Of course," Abby says, exchanging a significant look and smile with Gopher, "the sex was great too."

Michael and Meredith avoid each other's eyes. After their isolated captivity, their Love Scene had been both powerful and inspiring, but more so in the rehearsals.

Ziva looks to Gibbs, "I am just sorry you found no one to unwind the tension with."

"What tension? Solving cases, putting the bad guy away, _this_ is fun." He knows two of his people still have some unwinding scheduled. Good thing, too, because on Saturday the fourth Siobhan's niece is coming for a week's visit. The preparations for that visit had sparked an incident that Tony is still paying for. But he's in favor of all the unwinding his people can do; those Psych Re-evaluations are going to be a real–

"And we truly want to thank all of you," Harold McCabe says to him, freeing him from dwelling on their upcoming fate.

"Our pleasure." But he's never one for long goodbyes. "Come on, ship's docked."

x

"Wait." DiNozzo says, looking about the large group. "Can't leave yet. Where're the Gremlin and Probette?"

"Right over there," Gibbs says as the couple, pulling their rolling suitcases, come through the Promenade portside door accompanied by Nurse Barbara Copeland who, as they approach, slips a paper into Michelle's hand. She pushes it deep into her jeans pocket.

"Now Michelle," Abby confronts her as they join the group, "I meant what I said. You are not getting off this boat without telling us what happened to you on Saturday."

"It's a ship," Gopher supplies.

"I don't care if it's a Unterseeboot. Give."

"Sorry, Abby, still no can do."

This is intolerable. Kept out of Siobhan's revelation on Sunday which Ziva got and gave only to her tormentor, now this far more urgent issue, whatever it is, is beyond all reason. Her friend _fainted_ after a dramatic plea to her goddess and has refused to utter a word about it beyond versions of 'no comment' for four days. She turns to the one man who can get her answers. " _Gibbs_."

"Sorry, Abs. As long as she can do her job, she can make her husband's head explode anytime she wants to."

x

" _You_ know," DiNozzo says to Copeland. "You two have been joined at the hip for days."

"Sorry, Agent DiNozzo, professional ethics prevent me from saying more than that she fulfills Agent Gibbs' condition; she can do her job."

"What? HIPPA Regulations? We're Federal Agents. I can get a Warrant."

" _I'm_ in charge of Warrants," Michelle reminds him with a sweet yet victorious smile.

"Higher than HIPPA, anyway," Copeland tells him.

"Nurse/ Patient Confidentiality?"

" _Way_ higher. I'm Sworn to Secrecy." She turns to Michelle, two upraised and spread fingers touched to cheeks slightly below her eyes and spoken through. "Witch's Honor."

Michelle returns the same sign.

"Help," DiNozzo appeals sotto vocé, "it's the invasion of the 60's Sit-Coms."

x

"The '60s were good," Michelle declares, then sings "Now there was a tiiiiime, when they used to sa-ay..." she flashes a wink to Barbara, "that behind every - _great_ _man_ ," she points to her husband, "there had to be a-"

"Great woman!" Barbara picks up, "But innnnn these times of change, you know, it's no longer true-ooo,"

"So we're comin' 'way from the cauldron, 'cause there's something we forgot to say to you."

They step side by side to create the chorus that "Yeah, _Witches_ are doin' it for ourselves, standin' on our own two feet, ringing on our own bells."

"Book!"

"Candle!"

"You two start a hip bump, I'm throwing you both in the water."

"Ah, Tony, why'd you have to stop them?" Tim says. "I was looking forward to a little bump."

"You're married, McLetcher," he says with a wink to Siobhan.

"So is she," Jimmy says, tugging Michelle into a very close consultation.

But after a few seconds she does manage to break away to hug her sister. "Blessed be–"

"The blessed be."

x

"You mean," Abby demands, " _that's_ why every time I saw you two you were fused together?"

"Well, I wanted to get to know my west coast Coven Sister. She's from Blessed Harvest."

"And she's from Rising Star," Barbara says with an impish grin.

" _I know that!_ " She fixes her friend with a devastating glare. "You had me nine-tenths scared to Death! First you have a seizure and Faint and won't tell anyone why, then you spend the rest of the trip with the Nurse."

"I'm sorry. The one had nothing to do with the other - as in absolutely nothing bad. I promise."

"Then you _will_ tell us?"

"Ahhh, no."

x

"Let's get out of here, DiNozzo," Gibbs says, "before this lot sinks the ship."

The groups start gathering suitcases, evident that the conversations will continue on shore, but when they step away Julie cries " _Hey, wait a minute_!" and dashes around them to step in front of Gibbs, halting everyone behind them. "Jeth, you're not even going to say 'goodbye'?"

He half glances behind, but doesn't lower his voice. He has no reason to hide anything. "We said goodbye this morning."

"That was 'good morning'," she declares and grasps the lapels of his jacket. " _This_ is 'goodbye'." She pulls the tall man down, they cling to one another and no words are possible.

At least two pieces of luggage fall.

x

It will take a good deal longer for anyone else in the Lobby to find a word to say. By then Julie lets Jeth come up for air. "Now remember, you promised to look me up when you come out for that, what did you call it?"

"Office of Special Projects. Guaranteed."

"Good, because you and I are gonna have a Special Project of our own."

This time they can say nothing for a longer period.

x

"Hey, Tim," DiNozzo whispers. It took him this long for his voice to start working.

"Yeah, Tony?" he asks as quietly.

"Rule Number 22A?"

"I'm with you." He turns to relay the newest regulation to the team. "'Never, ever bother Gibbs while he's kissing'."

.

.

Next Episode: The Other Other Locked Room. As Tim strives to complete his fourth Novel before the dread Deadline, Gibbs and his team are handed their own Locked Room mystery.


End file.
